LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



DDDlTTDHfiba 




Glass. 
Book. 



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I 







FROM POVERTY TO POWER 



FROM 

POVERTY TO POWER 

OR 

THE REALIZATION OF PROSPERITY 
AND PEACE 

BY 

JAMES ALLEN 



Let Lovers bright sunshine play upon your heart; 

Come now unto your gladness^ peace and rest ; 
Bid the dark shades of selfishness depart^ 

And noio and evermore be truly blest. 



FIRST AMERICAN EDITION 




THE SCIENCE PRESS 
REPUBLIC BUILDING, CHICAGO 

1906 



3 



$& 






¥ 



R. DONNELLEY & SONS COMPANY 
CHICAGO 



INTRODUCTION. 

James Allen's New Work 
"From Poverty to Power." 

T N a special manner it may be said that God blesses 
* the author who consecrates his genius to such an 
uplifting theme as this, "From Poverty to Power." 

He blesses him with a spiritual discernment 
beyond the ken of the most of men, and then puts 
a pen into his hand and tells him to tell us all 
about the truths he sees. 

Such a man is James Allen, the author of this 
book. 

Human nature is doing nobly. 

Our progress is splendidly inspiring. 

Of this there is much evidence ; but of all the 
proofs there is none greater than humanity's hun- 
ger for spiritual food and God's method of pro- 
viding that food through such men as Mr. Allen. 

There was a time when such books as his would 
not have been happily received. 

Let us rejoice in the birthright of the blessed 
privilege of living in the Twentieth Century. Its 
page in history is destined to record the greatest 
blessings yet given to mankind. 

We are standing in the gray of its early dawn. 

Many demons which have distressed humanity 
shall be put down before the evening of the Twen- 
tieth Century arrives. 

One of them which is destined to be largely if 
not completely conquered is Poverty. 

Mr. Allen is one of the battling braves of our 
Twentieth Century morning. His weapons are 
effective, and one of the greatest of them, especially 
in the fight against the demon just mentioned, is 
his book "From Poverty to Power. " 

Let it go forth and do its work. 

THE SCIENCE PRESS. 



LIBRA -7£SS 

Two Con;o:; Received 

NOV 26 1906 

A C&jwriffta Entry 
! OLASS A X» 
COPY B. 






Copyright, 1906 

BY 

THE SCIENCE PRESS 



FOREWORD 

I looked around upon the world, and saw that 
it was shadowed by sorrow and scorched by the 
fierce fires of suffering. And I looked for the 
cause. I looked around, but could not find it; I 
looked in books, but could not find it ; I looked 
within, and found there both the cause and the 
self-made nature of that cause. I looked again, 
and deeper, and found the remedy. I found one 
Law, the Law of Love; one Life, the Life of ad- 
justment to that Law ; one Truth, the truth of a 
conquered mind and a quiet and obedient heart. 
And I dreamed of writing a book which should 
help men and women, whether rich or poor, learned 
or unlearned, worldly or unworldly, to find within 
themselves the source of all success, all happiness, 
all accomplishment, all truth. And the dream 
remained with me, and at last became substantial; 
and now I send it forth into the world on its 
mission of healing and blessedness, knowing that 
it cannot fail to reach the homes and hearts of those 
who are waiting and ready to receive it. 

JAMES ALLEN, 
vii 



CONTENTS 

PART I 
THE PATH OF PROSPERITY 

PAGE 

The Lesson of Evil 13 

The World a Reflex of Mental States . . . 22 

The Way out of Undesirable Conditions . . 32 
The Silent Power of Thought : Controlling and 

Directing One's Forces 54 

The Secret of Health, Success and Power . . 69 

The Secret of Abounding Happiness ... 88 

The Realization of Prosperity .... 99 

PART II 

THE WAY OF PEACE 

The Power of Meditation 107 

The Two Masters, Self and Truth . . .123 

The Acquirement of Spiritual Power . . .138 
The Realization of Selfless Love . . . .148 

Entering into the Infinite 166 

Saints, Sages, and Saviors : The Law of Service 180 
The Realization of Perfect Peace .... 194 



IX 



PART I 
THE PATH OF PROSPERITY 



THE LESSON OF EVIL 

Unrest and pain and sorrow are the shadows 
of life. There is no heart in all the world that 
has not felt the sting of pain, no mind that has 
not been tossed upon the dark waters of trouble, 
no eye that has not wept the hot, blinding tears 
of unspeakable anguish. There is no house- 
hold where the Great Destroyers, disease and 
death, have not entered, severing heart from 
heart, and casting over all the dark pall of 
sorrow. In the strong, and apparently inde- 
structible meshes of evil all are more or less 
fast caught, and pain, unhappiness, and mis- 
fortune wait upon mankind. 

With the object of escaping, or in some way 
mitigating this overshadowing gloom, men and 
women rush blindly into innumerable devices, 
pathways by which they fondly hope to enter 
into a happiness which will not pass away. 
Such are the drunkard and the harlot, who revel 
in sensual excitements; such is the exclusive 
aesthete, who shuts himself out from the sorrows 

■J 3 



14 The Path of Prosperity 

of the world, and surrounds himself with ener- 
vating luxuries; such is he who thirsts for 
wealth or fame, and subordinates all things to 
the achievement of that object; and such are 
they who seek consolation in the performance 
of religious rites. 

And to all the happiness sought seems to 
come, and the soul, for a time, is lulled into a 
sweet security, and an intoxicating forge tfulness 
of the existence of evil ; but the day of disease 
comes at last, or some great sorrow, tempta- 
tion, or misfortune breaks suddenly in on the 
unfortified soul, and the fabric of its fancied 
happiness is torn to shreds. 

So over the head of every personal joy hangs 
the Damocletian sword of pain, ready, at any 
moment, to fall and crush the soul of him who 
is unprotected by knowledge. 

The child cries to be a man or woman; the 
man and woman sigh for the lost felicity of 
childhood. The poor man chafes under the 
chains of poverty by which he is bound, and the 
rich man often lives in fear of poverty, or scours 
the world in search of an elusive shadow he 
calls happiness. Sometimes the soul feels that 
it has found a secure peace and happiness in 



The Lesson of Evil 15 

adopting a certain religion, in embracing an 
intellectual philosophy, or in building up an 
intellectual or artistic ideal; but some over- 
powering temptation proves the religion to be 
inadequate or insufficient ; the theoretical phil- 
osophy is found to be a useless prop; or in a 
moment, the idealistic statue upon which the 
devotee has for years been laboring, is shattered 
into fragments at his feet. 

Is there, then, no way of escape from pain 
and sorrow? Are there no means by which the 
bonds of evil may be broken? Is permanent 
happiness, secure prosperity, and abiding peace 
a foolish dream? No, there is a way, and I 
speak it with gladness, by which evil can be 
slain for ever; there is a process by which 
disease, poverty, or any adverse condition or 
circumstance can be put on one side never to 
return ; there is a method by which a permanent 
prosperity can be secured, free from all fear of 
the return of adversity, and there is a practice 
by which unbroken and unending peace and 
bliss can be partaken of and realized. And 
the beginning of the way which leads to this 
glorious realization is the acquirement of a right 
understanding of the nature of evil. 



16 The Path op Prosperity 

It is not sufficient to deny or ignore evil; it 
must be understood. It is not enough to pray- 
to God to remove the evil; you must find out 
why it is there, and what lesson it has for you. 
It is of no avail to fret and fume and chafe at 
the chains which bind you; you must know 
why and how you are bound. Therefore, reader, 
you must get outside yourself, and must begin 
to examine and understand yourself. You must 
cease to be a disobedient child in the school 
of experience, and must begin to learn, with 
humility and patience, the lessons that are set 
for your edification and ultimate perfection ; for 
evil, when rightly understood, is found to be, not 
an unlimited power or principle in the universe, 
but a passing phase of human experience, and it 
therefore becomes a teacher to those who are 
willing to learn. Evil is not an abstract some- 
thing outside yourself; it is an experience in 
your own heart, and by patiently examining 
and rectifying your heart you will be gradually 
led into the discovery of the origin and nature 
of evil, which will necessarily be followed by its 
complete eradication. 

All evil is corrective and remedial, and is 
therefore not permanent. It is rooted in igno- 



The Lesson of Evil 17 

ranee, ignorance of the true nature and relation 
of things, and so long as we remain in that state 
of ignorance, we remain subject to evil. There 
is r~ 'in the universe which is not the result 
of ignorance, and which would not, if we were 
ready and willing to learn its lesson, lead us to 
higher wisdom, and then vanish away. But 
men remain in evil, and it does not pass away 
because men are not willing or prepared to learn 
the lesson which it came to teach them. I knew 
a child who, every night when its mother took it 
to bed, cried to be allowed to play with the 
candle ; and one night, when the mother was off 
guard for a moment, the child took hold of the 
candle; the inevitable result followed, and the 
child never wished to play with the candle 
again. By its one foolish act it learned, and 
learned perfectly the lesson of obedience, and 
entered into the knowledge that fire burns. 
And this incident is a complete illustration of 
the nature, meaning, and ultimate result of all 
sin and evil. As the child suffered through its 
own ignorance of the real nature of fire, so older 
children suffer through their ignorance of the 
real nature of the things which they weep for 
and strive after, and which harm them when 



18 The Path of Prosperity 

they are secured; the only difference being that 
in the latter case the ignorance and evil are 
more deeply rooted and obscure. 

Evil has always been symbolized by darkness, 
and Good by light, and hidden within the 
symbol is contained the perfect interpretation, 
the reality; for, just as light always floods the 
universe, and darkness is only a mere speck or 
shadow cast by a small body intercepting a few 
rays of the illimitable light, so the Light of the 
Supreme Good is the positive and life-giving 
power which floods the universe, and evil the 
insignificant shadow cast by the self that in- 
tercepts and shuts off the illuminating rays 
which strive for entrance. When night folds 
the world in its black impenetrable mantle, no 
matter how dense the darkness, it covers but the 
small space of half our little planet, while the 
whole universe is ablaze with living light, and 
every soul knows that it will awake in the light 
in the morning. Know, then, that when the 
dark night of sorrow, pain, or misfortune settles 
down upon your soul, and you stumble along 
with weary and uncertain steps, that you are 
merely intercepting your own personal desires 
between yourself and the boundless light of joy 



The Lesson of Evil 19 

and bliss, and the dark shadow that covers you 
is cast by none and nothing but yourself. And 
just as the darkness without is but a negative 
shadow, an unreality which comes from nowhere, 
goes to nowhere, and has no abiding dwelling- 
place, so the darkness within is equally a 
negative shadow passing over the evolving and 
Light-born soul. 

M But," I fancy I hear someone say, ' ■ why 
pass through the darkness of evil at all?" 
Because, by ignorance, you have chosen to do 
so, and because, by doing so, you may under- 
stand both good and evil, and may the more 
appreciate the light by having passed through 
the darkness. As evil is the direct outcome of 
ignorance, so, when the lessons of evil are fully 
learned, ignorance passes away, and wisdom 
takes its place. But as a disobedient child 
refuses to learn its lessons at school, so it is 
possible to refuse to learn the lessons of ex- 
perience, and thus to remain in continual 
darkness, and to suffer continually recurring 
punishments in the form of disease, disap- 
pointment, and sorrow. He, therefore, who 
would shake himself free of the evil which 
encompasses him, must be willing and ready 



2o The Path of Prosperity 

to learn, and must be prepared to undergo 
that disciplinary process without which no 
grain of wisdom or abiding happiness and 
peace can be secured. 

A man may shut himself up in a dark room, 
and deny that the light exists, but it is every- 
where without, and darkness exists only in his 
own little room. So you may shut out the light 
of Truth, or you may begin to pull down the 
walls of prejudice, self-seeking and error which 
you have built around yourself, and so let in 
the glorious and omnipresent Light. 

By earnest self-examination strive to realize, 
and not merely hold as a theory, that evil is a 
passing phase, a self -created shadow; that all 
your pains, sorrows and misfortunes have come 
to you by a process of undeviating and abso- 
lutely perfect law; have come to you because 
you deserve and require them, and that by 
first enduring, and then understanding them, 
you may be made stronger, wiser, nobler. 
When you have fully entered into this realiza- 
tion, you will be in a position to mould your 
own circumstances, to transmute all evil into 
good and to weave, with a master hand, the 
fabric of your destiny. 



The Lesson of Evil 21 



What of the night, O Watchman! see'st thou yet 
The glimmering dawn upon the mountain heights, 
The golden Herald of the Light of lights, 

Are his fair feet upon the hilltops set? 

Cometh he yet to chase away the gloom, 
And with it all the demons of the Night? 
Strike yet his darting rays upon thy sight? 

Hear'st thou his voice, the sound of error's doom? 

The Morning cometh, lover of the Light; 

E 'en now He gilds with gold the mountain 's brow, 
Dimly I see the path whereon e'en now 

His shining feet are set toward the Night. 

Darkness shall pass away, and all the things 
That love the darkness, and that hate the Light 
Shall disappear for ever with the Night: 

Rejoice! for thus the speeding Herald sings. 



THE WORLD A REFLEX OF MENTAL 
STATES 

What you are, so is your world. Everything 
in the universe is resolved into your own in- 
ward experience. It matters little what is 
without, for it is all a reflection of your own 
state of consciousness. It matters everything 
what you are within, for everything without 
will be mirrored and colored accordingly. 

All that you positively know is contained in 
your own experience; all that you ever will 
know must pass through the gateway of ex- 
perience, and so become part of yourself. 

Your own thoughts, desires, and aspirations 
comprise your world, and, to you, all that 
there is in the universe of beauty and joy 
and bliss, or of ugliness and sorrow and pain, 
is contained within yourself. By your own 
thoughts you make or mar your life, your 
world, your universe. As you build within by 
the power of thought, so will your outward life 

22 



World a Reflex of Mental States 23 

and circumstances shape themselves accord- 
ingly. Whatsoever you harbor in the inmost 
chambers of your heart will, sooner or later 
by the inevitable law of reaction, shape itself 
in your outward life. The soul that is impure, 
sordid and selfish, is gravitating with unerring 
precision toward misfortune and catastrophe; 
the soul that is pure, unselfish, and noble, is 
gravitating with equal precision toward hap- 
piness and prosperity. Every soul attracts its 
own, and nothing can possibly come to it that 
does not belong to it. To realize this is to 
recognize the universality of Divine Law. The 
incidents of every human life, which both make 
and mar, are drawn to it by the quality and 
power of its own inner thought-life. Every 
soul is a complex combination of gathered 
experiences and thoughts, and the body is 
but an improvised vehicle for its manifestation. 
What, therefore, your thoughts are, that is 
your real self; and the world around, both 
animate and inanimate, wears the aspect with 
which your thoughts clothe it. ' ' All that we 
are is the result of what we have thought; it 
is founded on our thoughts; it is made up of 
our though ts." Thus said Buddha, and it 



24 The Path of Prosperity 

therefore follows that if a man is happy, it is 
because he dwells in happy thoughts; if miser- 
able, because he dwells in despondent and de- 
bilitating thoughts. Whether one be fearful 
or fearless, foolish or wise, troubled or serene, 
within that soul lies the cause of its own state 
or states, and never without. And now I 
seem to hear a chorus of voices exclaim, ' ' But 
do you really mean to say that outward cir- 
cumstances do not affect our minds ?" I do 
not say that, but I say this, and know it to be 
an infallible truth, that circumstances can only 
affect you in so far as you allow them to do so. 
You are swayed by circumstances because 
you have not a right understanding of the 
nature, use, and power of thought. You believe 
(and upon this little word belief hang all our 
sorrows and joys) that outward things have 
the power to make or mar your life; by so 
doing you submit to those outward things, 
confess that you are their slave, and they 
your unconditional master; by so doing, you 
invest them with a power which they do not, 
of themselves, possess, and you succumb, in 
reality, not to the mere circumstances, but 
to the gloom or gladness, the fear or hope, the 



World a Reflex of Mental States 25 

strength or weakness, which your thought- 
sphere has thrown around them. 

I knew two men who, at an early age, lost 
the hard-earned savings of years. One was 
very deeply troubled, and gave way to chagrin, 
worry, and despondency. The other, on read- 
ing in his morning paper that the bank in 
which his money was deposited had hopelessly 
failed, and that he had lost all, quietly and 
firmly remarked, "Well, it's gone, and trouble 
and worry won 't bring it back, but hard work 
will." He went to work with renewed vigor, 
and rapidly became prosperous, while the 
former man, continuing to mourn the loss of 
his money, and to grumble at his ' ' bad luck," 
remained the sport and tool of adverse circum- 
stances, in reality of his own weak and slavish 
thoughts. The loss of money was a curse to 
the one because he clothed the event with dark 
and dreary thoughts; it was a blessing to the 
other, because he threw around it thoughts of 
strength, of hope, and renewed endeavor. 

If circumstances had the power to bless or 
harm, they would bless and harm all men alike, 
but the fact that the same circumstances will 
be alike good and bad to different souls proves 



26 The Path of Prosperity 

that the good or bad is not in the circumstance, 
but only in the mind of him that encounters 
it. When you begin to realize this you will 
begin to control your thoughts, to regulate 
and discipline your mind, and to rebuild the 
inward temple of your soul, eliminating all 
useless and superfluous material, and incor- 
porating into your being thoughts alone of 
joy and serenity, of strength and life, of com- 
passion and love, of beauty and immortality; 
and as you do this you will become joyful 
and serene, strong and healthy, compassionate 
and loving, and beautiful with the beauty of 
immortality. 

And as we clothe events with the drapery 
of our own thoughts, so likewise do we clothe 
the objects of the visible world around us, 
and where one sees harmony and beauty, an- 
other sees revolting ugliness. An enthusiastic 
naturalist was one day roaming the country 
lanes in pursuit of his hobby, and during his 
rambles came upon a pool of brackish water 
near a farmyard. As he proceeded to fill a 
small bottle with the water for the purpose 
of examination under the microscope, he 
dilated, with more enthusiasm than discretion, 



World a Reflex of Mental States 27 

to an uncultivated son of the plough who stood 
close by, upon the hidden and innumerable 
wonders contained in the pool, and concluded 
by saying, ' ' Yes, my friend, within this pool 
is contained a hundred, nay, a million universes, 
had we but the sense or the instrument by 
which we could apprehend them." And the 
unsophisticated one ponderously remarked, ' ' I 
know the water be full o* tadpoles, but they 
be easy to catch. " 

Where the naturalist, his mind stored with 
the knowledge of natural facts, saw beauty, 
harmony, and hidden glory, the mind unen- 
lightened upon those things saw only an offen- 
sive mud-puddle. 

The wild flower which the casual wayfarer 
thoughtlessly tramples upon is, to the spiritual 
eye of the poet, an angelic messenger from 
the invisible. To the many, the ocean is but 
a dreary expanse of water on which ships sail 
and are sometimes wrecked; to the soul of 
the musician it is a living thing, and he hears, 
in all its changing moods, divine harmonies. 
Where the ordinary mind sees disaster and 
confusion, the mind of the philospher sees 
the most perfect sequence of cause and effect, 



28 The Path of Prosperity 

and where the materialist sees nothing but 
endless death, the mystic sees pulsating and 
eternal life. 

And as we clothe both events and objects 
with out own thoughts, so likewise do we 
clothe the souls of others in the garments of 
our thoughts. The suspicious believe every- 
body to be suspicious; the liar feels secure in 
the thought that he is not so foolish as to 
believe that there is such a phenomenon as 
a strictly truthful person; the envious see 
envy in every soul; the miser thinks every- 
body is eager to get his money; he who has 
subordinated conscience in the making of his 
wealth, sleeps with a revolver under his pillow, 
wrapt in the delusion that the world is full 
of conscienceless people who are eager to rob 
him, and the abandoned sensualist looks upon 
the saint as a hypocrite. On the other hand, 
those who dwell in loving thoughts, see that 
in all which calls forth their love and sym- 
pathy; the trusting and honest are not 
troubled by suspicions; the good-natured 
and charitable who rejoice at the good fortune 
of others, scarcely know what envy means; 
and he who has realized the Divine within 



World a Reflex of Mental States 29 

himself recognizes it in all beings, even in the 
beasts. 

And men and women are confirmed in their 
mental outlook because of the fact that, by 
the law of cause and effect, they attract to 
themselves that which they send forth, and so 
come in contact with people similar to them- 
selves. The old adage, ''Birds of a feather 
flock together," has a deeper significance than 
is generally attached to it, for in the thought- 
world as in the world of matter, each clings 
to its kind. 

1 ' Do you wish for kindness? Be kind. 
Do you ask for truth? Be true. 
What you give of yourself you find; 
Your world is a reflex of you. ' I 

If you are one of those who are praying 
for, and looking forward to, a happier world 
beyond the grave, here is a message of glad- 
ness for you, you may enter into and realize 
that happy world now; it fills the whole uni- 
verse, and it is within you, waiting for you to 
find, acknowledge, and possess. Said one who 
knew the inner laws of Being, " When men 
shall say lo here, or lo there, go not after 
them ; the kingdom of God is within you." 



30 The Path of Prosperity 

What you have to do is to believe this, simply 
believe it with a mind unshadowed by doubt, 
and then meditate upon it till you understand 
it. You will then begin to purify and to build 
your inner world, and as you proceed, passing 
from revelation to revelation, from realization 
to realization, you will discover the utter 
powerlessness of outward things beside the 
magic potency of a self -governed soul. 



World a Reflex of Mental States 31 



If thou would 'st right the world, 
And banish all its evils and its woes, 

Make its wild places bloom, 
And its drear deserts blossom as the rose, — 

Then right thyself . 

If thou would 'st turn the world 
From its long, lone captivity in sin, 

Restore all broken hearts, 
Slay grief, and let sweet consolation in, — 

Turn thou thyself. 

If thou would 'st cure the world 
Of its long sickness, end its grief and pain; 

Bring in all-healing Joy, 
And give to the afflicted rest again, — 

Then cure thyself. 

If thou would 'st wake the world 
Out of its dream of death and dark 'ning strife, 

Bring it to Love and Peace, 
And Light and brightness of immortal Life, — 

Wake thou thyself. 



THE WAY OUT OF UNDESIRABLE 
CONDITIONS 

Having seen and realized that evil is but a 
passing shadow thrown, by the intercepting 
self, across the transcedent Form of the 
Eternal Good, and that the world is a mirror 
in which each sees a reflection of himself, we 
now ascend, by firm and easy steps, to that 
plane of perception whereon is seen and 
realized the Vision of the Law. With this 
realization comes the knowledge that every- 
thing is included in a ceaseless interaction of 
cause and effect, and that nothing can pos- 
sibly be divorced from law. From the most 
trivial thought, word, or act of man, up to 
the groupings of the celestial bodies, law 
reigns supreme. No arbitrary condition can, 
even for one moment, exist, for such a con- 
dition would be a denial and an annihilation 
of law. Every condition of life is, therefore, 
bound up in an orderly and harmonious 
32 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 33 

sequence, and the secret and cause of e very- 
condition is contained within itself. The law, 
"Whatsoever a man sows that shall he also 
reap," is inscribed in flaming letters upon the 
portal of Eternity, and none can deny it, none 
can cheat it, none can escape it. He who puts 
his hand in the fire must suffer the burning 
until such time as it has worked itself out, 
and neither curses nor prayers can avail to 
alter it. And precisely the same law governs 
the realm of mind. Hatred, anger, jealousy, 
envy, lust, covetousness, all these are fires 
which burn, and whoever even so much as 
touches them must suffer the torments of 
burning. All these conditions of mind are 
rightly called "evil," for they are the efforts 
of the soul to subvert, in its ignorance, the 
law, and they, therefore, lead to chaos and 
confusion within, and are sooner or later 
actualized in the outward circumstances as 
disease, failure, and misfortune, coupled with 
grief, pain, and despair. Whereas love, gentle- 
ness, good- will, purity, are cooling airs which 
breathe peace upon the soul that wooes them, 
and, being in harmony with the Eternal Law, 
they become actualized in the form of health, 



34 The Path of Prosperity 

peaceful surroundings, and undeviating success 
and good fortune. 

A thorough understanding of this Great Law 
which permeates the universe leads to the 
acquirement of that state of mind known as 
obedience. To know that justice, harmony, and 
love are supreme in the universe is likewise 
to know that all adverse and painful conditions 
are the result of our own disobedience to that 
Law. Such knowledge leads to strength and 
power, and it is upon such knowledge alone 
that a true life and an enduring success 
and happiness can be built. To be patient 
under all circumstaces, and to accept all con- 
ditions as necessary factors in your training, 
is to rise superior to all painful conditions, 
and to overcome them with an overcoming 
which is sure, and which leaves no fear of 
their return, for by the power of obedience 
to law they are utterly slain. Such an obedient 
one is working in harmony with the law, has 
in fact, identified himself with the law, and 
whatsoever he conquers he conquers for ever; 
whatsoever he builds can never be destroyed. 

The cause of all power, as of all weakness, 
is within: the secret of all happiness as of 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 35 

all misery is likewise within. There is no 
progress apart from unfoldment within, and 
no sure foothold of prosperity or peace except 
by orderly advancement in knowledge. 

You say you are chained- by circumstances; 
you cry out for better opportunities, for a wider 
scope, for improved physical conditions, and 
perhaps you inwardly curse the fate that 
binds you hand and foot. It is for you that 
I write; it is to you that I speak. Listen, 
and let my words burn themselves into your 
heart, for that which I say to you is truth: — 
You may bring about that improved condition 
in your outward life which you desire, if you 
will unswervingly resolve to improve your inner 
life. I know this pathway looks barren at its 
commencement (truth always does, it is only 
error and delusion which are at first inviting 
and fascinating,) but if you undertake to walk 
it; if you perse veringly discipline your mind, 
eradicating your weaknesses, and allowing your 
soul-forces and spiritual powers to unfold them- 
selves, you will be astonished at the magical 
changes which will be brought about in your 
outward life. As you proceed, golden oppor- 
tunities will be strewn across your path, and 



36 The Path of Prosperity 

the power and judgment to properly utilize 
them will spring up within you. Genial friends 
will come unbidden to you; sympathetic souls 
will be drawn to you as the needle is to the 
magnet; and books and all outward aids that 
you require will come to you unsought. 

Perhaps the chains of poverty hang heavily 
upon you, and you are friendless and alone, 
and you long with an intense longing that 
your load may be lightened; but the load 
continues, and you seem to be enveloped in 
an ever-increasing darkness. Perhaps you 
complain, you bewail your lot; you blame 
your birth, your parents, your employer, or 
the unjust Powers who have bestowed upon 
you so undeservedly poverty and hardship, 
and upon another affluence and ease. Cease 
your complaining and fretting; none of these 
things which you blame are the cause of your 
poverty; the cause is within yourself, and 
where the cause is, there is the remedy. The 
very fact that you are a complainer, shows 
that you deserve your lot; shows that you 
lack that faith which is the ground of all 
effort and progress. There is no room for a 
complainer in a universe of law, and worry is 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 37 

soul-suicide. By your very attitude of mind 
you are strengthening the chains which bind 
you, and are drawing about you the darkness 
by which you are enveloped. Alter your out- 
look upon life, and your outward life will 
alter. Build yourself up in the faith and know- 
ledge, and make yourself worthy of better 
surroundings and wider opportunities. Be 
sure, first of all, that you are making the best 
of what you have. Do not delude yourself 
into supposing that you can step into greater 
advantages whilst overlooking smaller ones, for 
if you could, the advantage would be imper- 
manent and you would quickly fall back again 
in order to learn the lesson which you had 
neglected. As the child at school must master 
one standard before passing on to the next, so, 
before you can have that greater good which 
you so desire, must you faithfully employ that 
which you already possess. The parable of 
the talents is a beautiful story illustrative of this 
truth, for does it not plainly show that if we 
misuse, neglect, or degrade that which we pos- 
sess, be it ever so mean and insignificant, even 
that little will be taken from us, for, by our 
conduct we show that we are unworthy of it. 



38 The Path of Prosperity 

Perhaps you are living in a small cottage, 
and are surrounded by unhealthy and vicious 
influences. You desire a larger and more 
sanitary residence. Then you must fit your- 
self for such a residence by first of all mak- 
ing your cottage as far as possible a little 
paradise. Keep it spotlessly clean. Make it 
look as pretty and sweet as your limited 
means will allow. Cook your plain food with 
all care, and arrange your humble table as 
tastefully as you possibly can. If you cannot 
afford a carpet, let your rooms be carpeted 
with smiles and welcomes, fastened down with 
the nails of kind words driven in with the 
hammer of patience. Such a carpet will not 
fade in the sun, and constant use will never 
wear it away. 

By so ennobling your present surroundings 
you will rise above them, and above the need 
of them, and at the right time you will pass 
on into the better house and surroundings 
which have all along been waiting for you, 
and which you have fitted yourself to occupy. 

Perhaps you desire more time for thought 
and effort, and feel that your hours of labor 
are too hard and long. Then see to it that 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 39 

you are utilizing to the fullest possible extent 
what little spare time you have. It is useless 
to desire more time, if you are already wast- 
ing what little you have; for you would only 
grow more indolent and indifferent. 

Even poverty and lack of time and leisure 
are not the evils that you imagine they are, 
and if they hinder you in your progress, it is 
because you have clothed them in your own 
weaknesses, and the evil that you see in them 
is really in yourself. Endeavor to fully and 
completely realize that in so far as you shape 
and mould your mind, you are the maker of 
your destiny, and as, by the transmuting power 
of self-discipline you realize this more and 
more, you will come to see that these so-called 
evils may be converted into blessings. You 
will then utilize your poverty for the culti- 
vation of patience, hope and courage; and your 
lack of time in the gaining of promptness of 
action and decision of mind, by seizing the 
precious moments as they present themselves 
for your acceptance. As in the rankest soil 
the most beautiful flowers are grown, so in 
the dark soil of poverty the choicest flowers 
of humanity have developed and bloomed. 



40 The Path of Prosperity 

Where there are difficulties to cope with, and 
unsatisfactory conditions to overcome, there 
virtue most flourishes and manifests its glory. 
It may be that you are in the employ of 
a tyrannous master or mistress, and you feel 
that you are harshly treated. Look upon this 
also as necessary to your training. Return 
your employer's unkindness with gentleness 
and forgiveness. Practice unceasingly patience 
and self-control. Turn the disadvantage to ac- 
count by utilizing it for the gaining of mental 
and spiritual strength, and by your silent ex- 
ample and influence you will thus be teaching 
your employer, will be helping him to grow 
ashamed of his conduct, and will, at the same 
time, be lifting yourself up to that height of 
spiritual attainment by which you will be en- 
abled to step into new and more congenial 
surroundings at the time when they are pre- 
sented to you. Do not complain that you are 
a slave, but lift yourself up, by noble conduct, 
above the plane of slavery. Before complain- 
ing that you are a slave to another, be sure 
that you are not a slave to self. Look within ; 
look searchingly, and have no mercy upon 
yourself. You will find there, perchance, 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 41 

slavish thoughts, slavish desires, and in your 
daily life and conduct slavish habits. Conquer 
these; cease to be a slave to self, and no man 
will have the power to enslave you. As you 
overcome self, you will overcome all adverse 
conditions, and every difficulty will fall before 
you. 

Do not complain that you are oppressed by 
the rich. Are you sure that if you gained 
riches you would not be an oppressor your- 
self? Remember that there is the Eternal 
Law which is absolutely just, and that he 
who oppresses to-day must himself be op- 
pressed to-morrow; and from this there is no 
way of escape. And perhaps you, yesterday 
(in some former existence) were rich and an 
oppressor, and that you are now merely pay- 
ing off the debt which you owe to the Great 
Law. Practise, therefore, fortitude and faith. 
Dwell constantly in mind upon the Eternal 
Justice, the Eternal Good. Endeavor to lift 
yourself above the personal and the transitory 
into the impersonal and permanent. Shake 
off the delusion that you are being injured or 
oppressed by another, and try to realize, by 
a profounder comprehension of your inner life, 



42 The Path of Prosperity 

and the laws which govern that life, that you 
are only really injured by what is within you. 
There is no practice more degrading, debas- 
ing, and soul-destroying than that of self-pity. 
Cast it out from you. While such a canker 
is feeding upon your heart you can never 
expect to grow into a fuller life. Cease from 
the condemnation of others, and begin to con- 
demn yourself. Condone none of your acts, 
desires or thoughts that will not bear com- 
parison with spotless purity, or endure the 
light of sinless good. By so doing you will 
be building your house upon the rock of the 
Eternal, and all that is required for your 
happiness and well-being will come to you in 
its own time. 

There is positively no way of permanently 
rising above poverty, or any undesirable con- 
dition, except by eradicating those selfish and 
negative conditions within, of which these are 
the reflection, and by virtue of which they 
continue. The way to true riches is to enrich 
the soul by the acquisition of virtue. Outside 
of real heart-virtue there is neither prosperity 
nor power, but only the appearances of these. 
I am aware that men make money who have 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 43 

acquired no measure of virtue, and have little 
desire to do so; but such money does not 
constitute true riches, and its possession is 
transitory and feverish. Here is David's testi- 
mony: — " For I was envious at the foolish 

when I saw the prosperity of the wicked 

Their eyes stand out with fatness; they have 

more than heart could wish Verily I 

have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed 
my hands in innocency. . . .When I thought 
to know this it was too painful for me; until 
I went into the sanctuary of God, then under- 
stood I their end." The prosperity of the 
wicked was a great trial to David until he went 
into the sanctuary of God, and then he knew 
their end. You likewise may go into that 
sanctuary. It is within you. It is that "state 
of consciousness which remains when all that 
is sordid, and personal, and impermanent is 
risen above, and universal and eternal principles 
are realized. That is the God state of con- 
sciousness; it is the sanctuary of the Most 
High. When by long strife and self -discipline, 
you have succeeded in entering the door of 
that holy Temple, you will perceive, with un- 
obstructed vision, the end and fruit of all 



44 The Path of Prosperity 

human thought and endeavor, both good 
and evil. You will then no longer relax your 
faith when you see the immoral man accumu- 
lating outward riches, for you will know that 
he must come again to poverty and degrada- 
tion. The rich man who is barren of virtue is, in 
reality, poor, and as surely as the waters of the 
river are drifting to the ocean, so surely is he, 
in the midst of all his riches, drifting towards 
poverty and misfortune; and though he die 
rich, yet must he return to reap the bitter fruit 
of all of his immorality. And though he become 
rich many times, yet as many times must he 
be thrown back into poverty, until, by long ex- 
perience and suffering he conquers the poverty 
within. But the man who is outwardly poor, 
yet rich in virtue, is truly rich, and, in the 
midst of all his poverty he is surely travelling 
towards prosperity; and abounding joy and 
bliss await his coming. 

If you would become truly and permanently 
prosperous, you must first become virtuous. 
It is therefore unwise to aim directly at pros- 
perity, to make it the one object of life, to 
reach out greedily for it. To do this is to 
ultimately defeat yourself. But rather aim 



Way out op Undesirable Conditions 45 

at self-perfection, make useful and unselfish 
service the object of your life, and ever reach 
out hands of faith towards the supreme and 
unalterable Good. 

You say you desire wealth, not for your own 
sake, but in order to do good with it, and to 
bless others. If this is your real motive in 
desiring wealth, then wealth will come to you; 
for you are strong and unselfish indeed if, in 
the midst of riches, you are willing to look 
upon yourself as steward and not as owner. 
But examine well your motive, for in the 
majority of instances where money is desired 
for the admitted object of blessing others, the 
real underlying motive is a love of popularity, 
and a desire to pose as a philanthropist or 
reformer. If you are not doing good with what 
little you have, depend upon it the more 
money you got the more selfish you would 
become, and all the good you appeared to do 
with your money, if you attempted to do any, 
would be so much insinuating self -laudation. 
If your real desire is to do good, there is no 
need to wait for money before you do it; you 
can do it now, this very moment, and just 
where you are. If you are really so unselfish 



46 The Path of Prosperity 

as you believe yourself to be, you will show 
it by sacrificing yourself for others now. No 
matter how poor you are, there is room for 
self-sacrifice, for did not the widow put her 
all into the treasury? The heart that truly 
desires to do good does not wait for money 
before doing it, but comes to the altar of 
sacrifice, and, leaving there the unworthy 
elements of self, goes out and breathes upon 
neighbor and stranger, friend and enemy 
alike, the breath of blessedness. 

As the effect is related to the cause, so is 
prosperity and power related to the inward 
good, and poverty and weakness to the inward 
evil. 

Money does not constitute true wealth, nor 
position, nor power, and to rely upon it alone 
is to stand upon a slippery place. 

Your true wealth is your stock of virtue, 
and your true power the uses to which you 
put it. Rectify your heart, and you will rectify 
your life. Lust, hatred, anger, vanity, pride, 
covetousness, self-indulgence, self-seeking, ob- 
stinacy, — all these are poverty and weakness; 
whereas, love, purity, gentleness, meekness, 
patience, compassion, generosity, self-forget- 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 47 

fulness, and self-renunciation, — all these are 
wealth and power. 

As the elements of poverty and weakness 
are overcome, an irresistible and all-conquering 
power is evolved from within, and he who 
succeeds in establishing himself in the highest 
virtue, brings the whole world to his feet. 

But the rich, as well as the poor, have their 
undesirable conditions, and are frequently 
farther removed from happiness than the 
poor. And here we see how happiness de- 
pends, not upon outward aids or possessions, 
but upon the inward life. Perhaps you are 
an employer, and you have endless trouble 
with those whom you employ, and when you 
do get good and faithful servants they quickly 
leave you. As a result you are beginning to 
lose, or have completely lost, your faith in human 
nature. You try to remedy matters by giving 
better wages, and by allowing certain liberties, 
yet matters remain unaltered. Let me advise 
you. The secret of all your trouble is not in 
your servants, it is in yourself) and if you 
look within, with a humble and sincere desire 
to discover and eradicate your error, you will, 
sooner or later, find the origin of all your 



48 The Path of Prosperity 

unhappiness. It may be some selfish desire, 
or lurking suspicion, or unkind attitude of mind 
which sends out its poison upon those about 
you, and reacts upon yourself, even though you 
may not show it in your manner or speech. 
Think of your servants with kindness, consider 
their happiness and comfort, and never demand 
of them that extremity of service which you 
yourself would not care to perform were you in 
their place. Rare and beautiful is that humility 
of soul by which a servant entirely forgets him- 
self in his master's good; but far rarer, and 
beautiful with a divine beauty, is that nobility 
of soul by which a man, forgetting his own 
happiness, seeks the happiness of those who are 
under his authority, and who depend upon him 
for their bodily sustenance. And such a man's 
happiness is increased tenfold, nor does he need 
to complain of those whom he employs. Said 
a well known and extensive employer of labor, 
who never needs to dismiss an employe: " I 
have always had the happiest relations with my 
workpeople. If you ask me how it is to be 
accounted for, I can only say that it has been 
my aim from the first to do to them as I would 
wish to be done by." Herein lies the secret by 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 49 

which all desirable conditions are secured, and 
all that are undesirable are overcome. Do you 
say that you are lonely and unloved, and have 
" not a friend in the world"? Then, I pray 
you, for the sake of your own happiness, blame 
nobody but yourself. Be friendly towards 
others, and friends will soon flock round you. 
Make yourself pure and lovable, and you will 
be loved by all. 

Whatever conditions are rendering your life 
burdensome, you may pass out of and beyond 
them by developing and utilizing within you 
the transforming power of self-purification and 
self-conquest. Be it the poverty which galls 
(and remember that the poverty upon which 
I have been dilating is that poverty which is 
a source of misery, and not that voluntary 
poverty which is the glory of emancipated 
souls), or the riches which burden, or the 
many misfortunes, griefs, and annoyances 
which form the dark background in the web 
of life, you may overcome them by overcom- 
ing the selfish elements within which give 
them life. 

It matters not that by the unfailing Law 
there are past thoughts and acts to work out 



50 The Path of Prosperity 

and to atone for, as, by the same law, we are 
setting in motion, during every moment of our 
life, fresh thoughts and acts, and we have the 
power to make them good or ill. Nor does <■ 
it follow that if a man (reaping what he has 
sown) must lose money or forfeit position, 
that he must also lose his fortitude or forfeit 
his uprightness, and it is in these that 
his wealth and power and happiness are to 
be found. 

He who clings to self is his own enemy, and 
is surrounded by enemies. He who relinquishes 
self is his own savior, and is surrounded by 
friends like a protecting belt. Before the divine 
radiance of a pure heart all darkness vanishes 
and all clouds melt away, and he who has 
conquered self has conquered the universe. 
Come, then, out of your poverty; come out of 
your pain; come out of your troubles, and 
sighings, and complainings, and heartaches, and 
loneliness by coming out of yourself. Let the 
old tattered garment of your petty selfishness 
fall from you, and put on the new garment of 
universal Love. You will then realize the 
inward heaven, and it will be reflected in all 
your outward life. 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 51 

He who sets his foot firmly upon the path of 
self-conquest, who walks, aided by the staff of 
Faith, the highway of self-sacrifice, will assuredly 
achieve the highest prosperity, and will reap 
abounding and enduring joy and bliss. 



52 The Path Of Prosperity 

To them that seek the highest good 
All things subserve the wisest ends; 
Nought conies as ill, and wisdom lends 

Wings to all shapes of evil brood. 

The dark 'ning sorrow veils a Star 

That waits to shine with gladsome light; 
Hell waits on heaven; and after night 

Comes golden glory from afar. 

Defeats are steps by which we climb 
With purer aim to nobler ends; 
Loss leads to gain, and joy attends 

True footsteps up the hills of time. 

Pain leads to paths of holy bliss, 

To thoughts and words and deeds divine; 
And clouds that gloom and rays that shine, 

Along life 's upward highway kiss. 

Misfortune does but cloud the way 
Whose end and summit in the sky 
Of bright success, sunkiss 'd and high, 
Awaits our seeking and our stay. 

The heavy pall of doubts and fears 
That clouds the Valley of our hopes, 
The shades with which the spirit copes, 

The bitter harvesting of tears, 

The heartaches, miseries, and griefs, 
The bruisings born of broken ties, 
All these are steps by which we rise 

To living ways of sound beliefs. 



Way out of Undesirable Conditions 53 

Love, pitying, watchful, runs to meet 
The Pilgrim from the Land of Fate; 
All glory and all good await 

The coming of obedient feet. 



-: 



THE SILENT POWER OF THOUGHT 

CONTROLLING AND DIRECTING 

ONE'S FORCES 

The most powerful forces in the universe are 
the silent forces; and in accordance with the 
intensity of its power does a force become 
beneficent when rightly directed, and destructive 
when wrongly employed. This is a common 
knowledge in regard to the mechanical forces, 
such as steam, electricity, etc., but few have yet 
learned to apply this knowledge to the realm 
of mind, where the thought-forces (most power- 
ful of all) are continually being generated and 
sent forth as currents of salvation or destruction. 
At this stage of his evolution, man has 
entered into the possession of these forces, and 
the whole trend of his present advancement is 
their complete subjugation. All the wisdom 
possible to man on this material earth is to 
be found only in complete self-mastery, and the 
command, ' ' Love your enemies, " resolves itself 
into an exhortation to enter here and now, into 

54 



The Silent Power of Thought 55 

the possession of that sublime wisdom by taking 
hold of, mastering and transmuting, those mind 
forces to which man is now slavishly subject, 
and by which he is helplessly borne, like a straw 
on the stream, upon the currents of selfishness. 

The Hebrew prophets, with their perfect 
knowledge of the Supreme Law, always 
related outward events to inward thought, 
and associated national disaster or success 
with the thoughts and desires that dominated 
the nation at the time. The knowledge of the 
causal power of thought is the basis of all their 
prophecies, as it is the basis of all real wisdom 
and power. National events are simply the 
working out of the psychic forces of the 
nation. Wars, plagues, and famines are the 
meeting and clashing of wrongly-directed 
thought-forces, the culminating points at 
which destruction steps in as the agent of 
the Law. It is foolish to ascribe war to the 
influence of one man, or to one body of men. 
It is the crowning horror of national selfishness. 

It is the silent and conquering thought-forces 
which bring all things into manifestation. The 
universe grew out of thought. Matter in its 
last analysis is found to be merely objectivized 



56 The Path of Prosperity 

thought. All men 's accomplishments were first 
wrought out in thought, and then objectivized, 
The author, the inventor, the architect, first 
builds up his work in thought, and having 
perfected it in all its parts as a complete and 
harmonious whole upon the thought-plane, he 
then commences to materialize it, to bring it 
down to the material or sense-plane. 

When the thought-forces are directed in 
harmony with the over-ruling Law, they are 
up-building and preservative, but when sub- 
verted they become disintegrating and self- 
destructive. 

To adjust all your thoughts to a perfect and 
unswerving faith in the omnipotence and 
supremacy of Good, is to co-operate with 
that Good, and to realize within yourself the 
solution and destruction of all evil. Believe 
and ye shall live. And here we have the true 
meaning of salvation; salvation from the dark- 
ness and negation of evil, by entering into, and 
realizing the living light of the Eternal Good. 

Where there is fear, worry, anxiety, doubt, 
trouble, chagrin, or disappointment, there is 
ignorance and lack of faith. All these con- 
ditions of mind are the direct outcome of 



The Silent Power of Thought 57 

selfishness, and are based upon an inherent 
belief in the power and supremacy of evil; 
they therefore constitute practical atheism; 
and to live in, and become subject to, these 
negative and soul-destroying conditions of 
mind is the only real atheism. 

It is salvation from such conditions that the 
race needs, and let no man boast of salvation 
whilst he is their helpless and obedient slave. 
To fear or to worry is as sinful as to curse, 
for how can one fear or worry if he intrin- 
sically believes in the Eternal Justice, the 
Omnipotent Good, the Boundless Love? To 
fear, to worry, to doubt, is to deny, to dis- 
believe. 

It is from such states of mind that all weak- 
ness and failure proceed, for they represent the 
annulling and disintegrating of the positive 
thought-forces which would otherwise speed 
to their object with power, and bring about 
their own beneficent results. 

To overcome these negative conditions is to 
enter into a life of power, is to cease to be a 
slave, and to become a master, and there is only 
one way by which they can be overcome, and 
that is by steady and persistent growth in inward 



58 The Path of Prosperity 

knowledge. To mentally deny evil is not suffi- 
cient; it must, by daily practice, be risen above 
and understood. To mentally affirm the good 
is inadequate; it must, by unswerving endea- 
vor, be entered into and comprehended. 

The intelligent practice of self-control, 
quickly leads to a knowledge of one's interior 
thought-forces, and, later on, to the acquisi- 
tion of that power by which they are rightly 
employed and directed. In the measure that 
you master self, that you control your mental 
forces instead of being controlled by them, in 
just such measure will you master affairs and 
outward circumstances. 

Show me a man under whose touch every- 
thing crumbles away, and who cannot retain 
success even when it is placed in his hands, 
and I will show you a man who dwells con- 
tinually in those conditions of mind which are 
the very negation of power. To be for ever 
wallowing in the bogs of doubt, to be drawn 
continually into the quicksands of fear, or 
blown ceaselessly about by the winds of 
anxiety, is to be a slave, and to live the life 
of a slave, even though success and influence 
be for ever knocking at your door seeking for 



The Silent Power of Thought 59 

admittance. Such a man, being without faith 
and without self-government, is incapable of 
the right government of his affairs, and is a 
slave to circumstances; in reality a slave to 
himself. Such are taught by affliction, and 
ultimately pass from weakness to strength by 
the stress of bitter experience. 

Faith and purpose constitute the motive- 
power of life. There is nothing that a strong 
faith and an unflinching purpose may not 
accomplish. By the daily exercise of silent 
faith, the thought-forces are gathered together, 
and by the daily strengthening of silent pur- 
pose, those forces are directed toward the ob- 
ject of accomplishment. 

Whatever your position in life may be, be- 
fore you can hope to enter into any measure 
of success, usefulness, and power, you must 
learn how to focus your thought-forces by 
cultivating calmness and repose. It may be 
that you are a business man, and you are 
suddenly confronted with some overwhelming 
difficulty or probable disaster. You grow 
fearful and anxious, and are at your wit's 
end. To persist in such a state of mind 
would be fatal, for when anxiety steps in, 



60 The Path of Prosperity 

correct judgment passes out. Now if you 
will take advantage of a quiet hour or two 
in the early morning or at night, and go 
away to some solitary spot, or to some room 
in your house where you know you will be 
absolutely free from intrusion, and, having 
seated yourself in an easy attitude, you 
forcibly direct your mind right away from 
the object of anxiety by dwelling upon some- 
thing in your life that is pleasing and bliss- 
giving, a calm, reposeful strength will gradually 
steal into your mind, and your anxiety will 
pass away. Upon the instant that you find 
your mind reverting to the lower plane of 
worry bring it back again, and re-establish it 
on the plane of peace and strength. When 
this is fully accomplished, you may then con- 
centrate your whole mind upon the solution 
of your difficulty, and what was intricate and 
insurmountable to you in your hour of anxiety 
will be made plain and easy, and you will see, 
with that clear vision and perfect judgment 
which belong only to a calm and untroubled 
mind, the right course to pursue and the 
proper end to be brought about. It may be 
that you will have to try day after day before 



The Silent Power of Thought 6i 

you will be able to perfectly calm your mind, 
but if you persevere you will certainly accom- 
plish it. And the course which is presented 
to you in that hour of calmness must be carried 
out. Doubtless when you are again involved 
in the business of the day, and worries again 
creep in and begin to dominate you, you will 
begin to think that the course is a wrong or 
foolish one, but do not heed such suggestions. 
Be guided absolutely and entirely by the 
vision of calmness, and not by the shadows 
of anxiety. The hour of calmness is the hour 
of illumination and correct judgment. By such 
a course of mental discipline the scattered 
thought-forces are re-united, and directed, like 
the rays of the search-light, upon the problem 
at issue, with the result that it gives way before 
them. 

There is no difficulty, however great, but 
will yield before a calm and powerful concen- 
tration of thought, and no legitimate object 
but may be speedily actualized by the intelli- 
gent use and direction of one's soul-forces. 

Not until you have gone deeply and search- 
ingly into your inner nature, and have over- 
come many enemies that lurk there, can you 



62 The Path of Prosperity 

have any approximate conception of the subtle 
power of thought, of its inseparable relation 
to outward and material things, or of its 
magical potency, when rightly poised and 
directed, in readjusting and transforming the 
life-conditions. 

Every thought you think is a force sent 
out, and in accordance with its nature and 
intensity will it go out to seek a lodgment 
in minds receptive to it, and will react upon 
yourself for good or evil. There is ceaseless 
reciprocity between mind and mind, and a con- 
tinual interchange of thought-forces. Selfish 
and disturbing thoughts are so many malignant 
and destructive forces, messengers of evil, sent 
out to stimulate and augment the evil in other 
minds, which in turn send them back upon 
you with added power. While thoughts that 
are calm, pure, and unselfish are so many 
angelic messengers sent out into the world 
with health, healing, and blessedness upon 
their wings, counteracting the evil forces; pour- 
ing the oil of joy upon the troubled waters of 
anxiety and sorrow, and restoring to broken 
hearts their heritage of immortality. 
, Think good thoughts, and they will quickly 



The Silent Power of Thought 63 

become actualized in your outward life in the 
form of good conditions. Control your soul- 
forces, and you will be able to shape your 
outward life as you will. The difference 
between a savior and a sinner is this, that 
the one has a perfect control of all the forces 
within him; the other is dominated and con- 
trolled by them. 

There is absolutely no other way to true 
power and abiding peace, but by self-control, 
self-government, self -purification. To be at 
the mercy of your disposition is to be im- 
potent, unhappy, and of little real use in the 
world. The conquest of your petty likes and 
dislikes, your capricious loves and hates, your 
fits of anger, suspicion, jealousy, and all the 
changing moods to which you are more or less 
helplessly subject, this is the task you have 
before you if you would weave into the web 
of life the golden threads of happiness and 
prosperity. In so far as you are enslaved by 
the changing moods within you, will you need 
to depend upon others and upon outward aids 
as you walk through life. If you would walk 
firmly and securely, and would accomplish any 
achievement, you must learn to rise above 



64 The Path of Prosperity 

and control all such disturbing and retarding 
vibrations. You must daily practice the habit 
of putting your mind at rest, ' * going into the 
silence," as it is> commonly called. This is a 
method of replacing a troubled thought with 
one of peace, a thought of weakness with one 
of strength. . Until you succeed in doing this 
you cannot hope to direct your mental forces 
upon the problems and pursuits of life with 
any appreciable measure of success. It is a 
process of diverting one's scattered forces into 
one powerful channel. Just as a useless marsh 
may be converted into a field of golden corn 
or a fruitful garden by draining and directing 
the scattered and harmful streams into one 
well-cut channel, so, he who acquires calmness, 
and subdues and directs the thought-currents 
within himself, saves his soul, and fructifies his 
heart and life. 

As you succeed in gaining mastery over your 
impulses and thoughts you will begin to feel, 
growing up within you, a new and silent 
power, and a settled feeling of composure and 
strength will remain with you. Your latent 
powers will begin to unfold themselves, and 
whereas formerly your efforts were weak and 



The Silent Power of Thought 65 

ineffectual, you will now be able to work with 
that calm confidence which commands success. 
And along with this new power and strength, 
there will be awakened within you that interior 
illumination known as " intuition," and you 
will walk no longer in darkness and specula- 
tion, but in light and certainty. With the 
development of this soul-vision, judgment and 
mental penetration will be incalculably in- 
creased, and there will evolve within you 
that prophetic vision by the aid of which 
you will be able to sense coming events, and 
to forecast, with remarkable accuracy, the 
result of your efforts. And in just the 
measure that you alter from within will your 
outlook upon life alter; and as you alter your 
mental attitude towards others they will alter 
in their attitude and conduct toward you. 
As you rise above the lower, debilitating, and 
destructive thought-forces, you will come in 
contact with the positive, strengthening, and 
up-building currents generated by strong, pure, 
and noble minds, your happiness will be im- 
measurably intensified, and you will begin to 
realize the joy, strength, and power, which 
are born only of self-mastery. And this joy, 



66 The Path of Prosperity 

strength, and power will be continually radiat- 
ing from you, and without any effort on your 
part, nay, though you are utterly unconscious 
of it, strong people will be drawn toward 
you, influence will be put into your hands, 
and in accordance with your altered thought- 
world will outward events shape themselves. 
11 A man's foes are they of his own house- 
hold," and he who would be useful, strong, 
and happy, must cease to be a passive recep- 
tacle for the negative, beggardly, and impure 
streams of thought; and as a wise householder 
commands his servants and invites his guests, 
so must he learn to command his desires, and 
to say, with authority, what thoughts he shall 
admit into the mansion of his soul. Even a 
very partial success in self-mastery adds greatly 
to one 's power, and he who succeeds in perfect- 
ing this divine accomplishment, enters into 
possession of undreamed-of wisdom and inward 
strength and peace, and realizes that all the 
forces of the universe aid and protect his 
footsteps Who is master of his soul. 



The Silent Power of Thought 67 

Would you scale the highest heaven, 
Would you pierce the lowest hell, — 

Live in dreams of constant beauty, 
Or in basest thinkings dwell. 

For your thoughts are heaven above you, 
And your thoughts are hell below; 

Bliss is not, except in thinking, 

Torment nought but thought can know. 

Worlds would vanish but for thinking ; 

Glory is not but in dreams ; 
And the Drama of the ages 

From the Thought Eternal streams. 

Dignity and shame and sorrow, 

Pain and anguish, love and hate 
Are but maskings of the mighty 

Pulsing Thought that governs Fate. 

As the colors of the rainbow 

Makes the one uncolored beam, 
So the universal changes 

Make the One Eternal Dream. 

And the Dream is all within you, 

And the Dreamer waiteth long 
For the Morning to awake him 

To the living thought and strong. 

That shall make the ideal real, 

Make to vanish dreams of hell 
In the highest, holiest heaven 

Where the pure and perfect dwell. 



68 The Path of Prosperity 

Evil is the thought that thinks it ; 

Good, the thought that makes it so ; 
Light and darkness, sin and pureness 

Likewise out of thinking grow. 

Dwell in thought upon the Grandest, 
And the Grandest you shall see ; 

Fix your mind upon the Highest, 
And the Highest you shall be. 



THE SECRET OF HEALTH, SUCCESS 
AND POWER 

We all remember with what intense delight, 
as children, we listened to the never- tiring 
fairy-tale. How eagerly we followed the 
fluctuating fortunes of the good boy or girl, 
ever protected, in the hour of crisis, from 
the evil machinations of the scheming witch, 
the cruel giant, or the wicked king. And 
our little hearts never faltered for the fate 
of the hero or heroine, nor did we doubt their 
ultimate triumph over all their enemies, for 
we knew that the fairies were infallible, and 
that they would never desert those who had 
consecrated themselves to the good and the 
true. And what unspeakable joy pulsated 
within us when the Fairy-Queen, bringing all 
her magic to bear at the critical moment, 
scattered all the darkness and trouble, and 
granted them the complete satisfaction of all 
their hopes, and they were " happy ever 
after.' ' 

69 



70 The Path of Prosperity 

With the accumulating years, and an ever- 
increasing intimacy with the so-called ' ' reali- 
ties" of life, our beautiful fairy-world became 
obliterated, and its wonderful inhabitants were 
relegated, in the archives of memory, to the 
shadowy and unreal. And we thought we were 
wise and strong in thus leaving for ever the 
land of childish dreams, but as we re-become 
little children in the wondrous world of wisdom, 
we shall return again to the inspiring dreams 
of childhood and find that they are, after all, 
realities. 

The fairy-folk, so small and nearly always 
invisible, yet possessed of an all-conquering 
and magical power, who bestow upon the 
good, health, wealth, and happiness, along 
with all the gifts of nature in lavish profusion, 
start again into reality and become immortal- 
ized in the soul-realm of him who, by growth 
in wisdom, has entered into a knowledge of 
the power of thought, and the laws which 
govern the inner world of being. To him the 
fairies live again as thought-people, thought- 
messengers, thought-powers working in har- 
mony with the over-ruling Good. And they 
who, day by day, endeavor to harmonize 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 71 

their hearts with the heart of the Supreme 
Good, do in reality acquire true health, wealth, 
and happiness. There is no protection to 
compare with goodness, and by ll goodness" I 
do not mean a mere outward conformity to 
the rules of morality; I mean pure thought, 
noble aspiration, unselfish love, and freedom 
from vainglory. To dwell continually in good 
thoughts, is to throw around oneself a psychic 
atmosphere of sweetness and power which 
leaves its impress upon all who come in con- 
tact with it. 

As the rising sun puts to rout the helpless 
shadows, so are all the impotent forces of evil 
put to flight by the searching rays of positive 
thought which shine forth from a heart made 
strong in purity and faith. 

Where there is sterling faith and uncom- 
promising purity there is health, there is suc- 
cess, there is power. In such a one, disease, 
failure, and disaster can find no lodgment, for 
there is nothing on which they can feed. 

Even physical conditions are largely deter- 
mined by mental states, and to this truth the 
scientific world is rapidly being drawn. The 
old, materialistic belief that a man is what 



72 The Path of Prosperity 

his body makes him, is rapidly passing away, 
and is being replaced by the inspiring belief 
that man is superior to his body, and that his 
body is what he makes it by the power of 
thought. Men everywhere are ceasing to be- 
lieve that a man is despairing because he is 
dyspeptic, and are coming to understand that 
he is dyspeptic because he is despairing, and 
in the near future, the fact that all disease 
has its origin in the mind will become common 
knowledge. 

There is no evil in the universe but has its 
root and origin in the mind, and sin, sickness, 
sorrow, and affliction do not, in reality, belong 
to the universal order, are not inherent in 
the nature of things, but are the direct out- 
come of our ignorance of the right relations of 
things. 

According to tradition, there once lived, in 
India, a school of philosophers who led a life 
of such absolute purity and simplicity that they 
commonly reached the age of one hundred and 
fifty years, and to fall sick was looked upon by 
them as an unpardonable disgrace, for it was 
considered to indicate a violation of law. 

The sooner we realize and acknowledge that 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 73 

sickness, far from being the arbitrary visita- 
tion of an offended God, or the test of an 
unwise Providence, is the result of our own 
error or sin, the sooner shall we enter upon 
the highway of health. Disease comes to 
those who attract it, to those whose minds and 
bodies are receptive to it, and flees from those 
whose strong, pure, and positive thought-sphere 
generates healing and life-giving currents. 

If you are given to anger, worry, jealousy, 
greed, or any other inharmonious state of 
mind, and expect perfect physical health, you 
are expecting the impossible, for you are con- 
tinually sowing the seeds of disease in your 
mind. Such conditions of mind are carefully 
shunned by the wise man, for he knows them 
to be far more dangerous than a bad drain or 
an infected house. 

If you would be free from all physical aches 
and pains, and would enjoy perfect physical 
harmony, then put your mind in order, and har- 
monize your thoughts. Think joyful thoughts; 
think loving thoughts ; let the elixir of goodwill 
course through your veins, and you will need 
no other medicine. Put away your jealousies, 
your suspicions, your worries, your hatreds, 



74 The Path of Prosperity 

your selfish indulgences, and you will put 
away your dyspepsia, your biliousness, your 
nervousness and aching joints. If you will 
persist in clinging to these debilitating and 
demoralizing habits of mind, then do not 
complain when your body is laid low with 
sickness. 

The following story illustrates the close 
relation that exists between habits of mind 
and bodily conditions: — A certain man was 
afflicted with a painful disease, and he tried 
one physician after another, but all to no pur- 
pose. He then visited towns which were 
famous for their curative waters, and after 
having bathed in them all, his disease was 
more painful than ever. One night he dreamed 
that a Presence came to him and said, ' ' Brother, 
hast thou tried all the means of cure?" and 
he replied, "I have tried all." " Nay," said 
the Presence, " Come with me, and I will 
show thee a healing bath which has escaped 
thy notice." The afflicted man followed, and 
the Presence led him to a clear pool of water, 
and said, " Plunge thyself in this water and 
thou shalt surely recover, ' ' and thereupon 
vanished. The man plunged into the water, 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 75 

and on coming out, lo! his disease had left 
him, and at the same moment he saw written 
above the pool the word ' * Renounce. ' ' Upon 
waking, the full meaning of his dream flashed 
across his mind, and looking within he dis- 
covered that he had, all along, been a victim 
to a sinful indulgence, and he vowed that he 
would renounce it for ever. He carried out 
his vow, and from that day his affliction began 
to leave him, and in a short time he was com- 
pletely restored to health. 

Many people complain that they have broken 
down through over-work. In the majority of 
such cases the breakdown is more frequently 
the result of foolishly wasted energy. If you 
would secure health you must learn to work 
without friction. To become anxious or ex- 
cited, or to worry over needless details is to 
invite a breakdown. Work, whether of brain 
or body, is beneficial and health-giving, and 
the man who can work with a steady and calm 
persistency, freed from all anxiety and worry, 
and with his mind utterly oblivious to all but 
the work he has in hand, will not only accom- 
plish far more than the man who is always 
hurried and anxious, but he will retain his 



76 The Path of Prosperity 

health, a boon which the other quickly for- 
feits. 

True health and true success go together, 
for they are inseparably intertwined in the 
thought-realm. As mental harmony produces 
bodily health, so it also leads to a harmonious 
sequence in the actual working out of one's 
plans. Order your thoughts and you will order 
your life. Pour the oil of tranquillity upon 
the turbulent waters of the passions and pre- 
judices, and the tempests of misfortune, how- 
soever they may threaten, will be powerless to 
wreck the barque of your soul, as it threads 
its way across the ocean of life. And if that 
barque be piloted by a cheerful and never- 
failing faith its course will be doubly sure, and 
many perils will pass it by which would other- 
wise attack it. By the power of faith every 
enduring work is accomplished. Faith in the 
Supreme; faith in the over-ruling Law; faith 
in your work, and in your power to accomplish 
that work, — here is the rock upon which you 
must build if you would achieve, if you would 
stand and not fall. To follow, under all cir- 
cumstances, the highest promptings within 
you; to be always true to the divine self; to 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 77 

rely upon the inward Light, the inward Voice, 
and to pursue your purpose with a fearless 
and restful heart, believing that the future 
will yield unto you the meed of every thought 
and effort; knowing that the laws of the uni- 
verse can never fail, and that your own will 
come back to you with mathematical exacti- 
tude, this is faith and the living of faith. By 
the power of such a faith the dark waters of 
uncertainty are divided, every mountain of 
difficulty crumbles away, and the believing 
soul passes on unharmed. Strive, O reader! 
to acquire, above everything, the priceless 
possession of this dauntless faith, for it is the 
talisman of happiness, of success, of peace, of 
power, of all that makes life great and superior 
to suffering. Build upon such a faith, and you 
build upon the Rock of the Eternal, and with 
the materials of the Eternal, and the structure 
that you erect will never be dissolved, for it 
will transcend all the accumulations of material 
luxuries and riches, the end of which is dust. 
Whether you are hurled into the depths of 
sorrow or lifted upon the heights of joy, ever 
retain your hold upon this faith, ever return 
to it as your rock of refuge, and keep your 



78 The Path of Prosperity 

feet firmly planted upon its immortal and im- 
movable base. Centered in such a faith, you 
will become possessed of such a spiritual 
strength as will shatter, like so many toys of 
glass, all the forces of evil that are hurled 
against you, and you will achieve a success 
such as the mere striver after worldly gain 
can never know or even dream of. " If ye 
have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only 
do this, . . . but if ye shall say unto this 
mountain, be thou removed and be thou cast 
into the sea, it shall be done. " 

There are those to-day, men and women 
tabernacled in flesh and blood, who have 
realized this faith, who live in it and by it 
day by day, and who, having put it to the 
uttermost test, have entered into the posses- 
sion of its glory and peace. Such have sent 
out the word of command, and the mountains 
of sorrow and disappointment, of mental weari- 
ness and physical pain have passed from them, 
and have been cast into the sea of oblivion. 

If you will become possessed of this faith 
you will not need to trouble about your 
success or failure, and success will come. You 
will not need to become anxious about results, 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 79 

but will work joyfully and peacefully, knowing 
that right thoughts and right efforts will in- 
evitably bring about right results. 

I know a lady who has entered into many 
blissful satisfactions, and recently a friend re- 
marked to her, " Oh, how fortunate you are! 
You only have to wish for a thing, and it 
comes to you. ' ' And it did, indeed, appear so 
on the surface; but in reality all the blessed- 
ness that has entered into this woman's life 
is the direct outcome of the inward state of 
blessedness which she has, throughout life, 
been cultivating and training toward perfection. 
Mere wishing brings nothing but disappoint- 
ment; it is living that tells. The foolish wish 
and grumble ; the wise, work and wait. And 
this woman had worked; worked without and 
within, but especially within upon heart and 
soul; and with the invisible hands of the spirit 
she had built up, with the precious stones of 
faith, hope, joy, devotion, and love, a fair temple 
of light, whose glorifying radiance was ever 
round about her. It beamed in her eye ; it 
shone through her countenance ; it vibrated in 
her voice; and all who came into her presence 
felt its captivating spell. 



80 The Path of Prosperity 

And as with her, so with you. Your success, 
your failure, your influence, your whole life you 
carry about with you, for your dominant trends 
of thought are the determining factors in your 
destiny. Send forth loving, stainless, and happy 
thoughts, and blessings will fall into your hands, 
and your table will be spread with the cloth 
of peace. Send forth hateful, impure, and un- 
happy thoughts, and curses will rain down upon 
you, and fear and unrest will wait upon your 
pillow. You are the unconditional maker of 
your fate, be that fate what it may. Every 
moment you are sending forth from you the 
influences which will make or mar your life. 
Let your heart grow large and loving and 
unselfish, and great and lasting will be your 
influence and success, even though you make 
little money. Confine it within the narrow 
limits of self-interest, and even though you 
become a millionaire your influence and suc- 
cess, at the final reckoning will be found to be 
utterly insignificant. 

Cultivate, then, this pure and unselfish spirit, 
and combine with purity and faith, single- 
ness of purpose, and you are evolving from 
within the elements, not only of abounding 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 8i 

health and enduring success, but of greatness 
and power. 

If your present position is distasteful to you, 
and your heart is not in your work, nevertheless 
perform your duties with scrupulous diligence, 
and whilst resting your mind in the idea that 
the better position and greater opportunities are 
waiting for you, ever keep an active mental 
outlook for budding possibilities, so that when 
the critical moment arrives, and the new channel 
presents itself, you will step into it with your 
mind fully prepared for the undertaking, and 
with that intelligence and foresight which is 
born of mental discipline. 

Whatever your task may be, concentrate 
your whole mind upon it, throw into it all the 
energy of which you are capable. The fault- 
less completion of small tasks leads inevitably 
to larger tasks. See to it that you rise by 
steady climbing, and you will never fall. And 
herein lies the secret of true power. Learn, 
by constant practice, how to husband your 
resources, and to concentrate them, at any 
moment, upon a given point. The foolish 
waste all their mental and spiritual energy 
in frivolity, foolish chatter, or selfish argu- 



82 The Path of Prosperity 

ment, not to mention wasteful physical ex- 
cesses. 

If you would acquire overcoming power you 
must cultivate poise and passivity. You must 
be able to stand alone. All power is asso- 
ciated with immovability. The mountain, the 
massive rock, the storm-tried oak, all speak to 
us of power, because of their combined solitary 
grandeur and defiant fixity; while the shifting 
sand, the yielding twig, and the waving reed 
speak to us of weakness, because they are 
movable and non-resistant, and are utterly 
useless when detached from their fellows. He 
is the man of power who, when all his fellows 
are swayed by some emotion or passion, re- 
mains calm and unmoved. 

He only is fitted to command and control 
who has succeeded in commanding and con- 
trolling himself. The hysterical, the fearful, 
the thoughtless and frivolous, let such seek 
company, or they will fall for lack of support; 
but the calm, the fearless, the thoughtful, and 
grave, let such seek the solitude of the forest, 
the desert, and the mountain-top, and to their 
power more power will be added, and they 
will more and more successfully stem the 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 83 

psychic currents and whirlpools which engulf 
mankind. 

Passion is not power; it is the abuse of 
power, the dispersion of power. Passion is like 
a furious storm which beats fiercely and wildly 
upon the embattled rock, whilst power is like 
the rock itself, which remains silent and un- 
moved through it all. That was a manifesta- 
tion of true power when Martin Luther, wearied 
with the persuasions of his fearful friends, who 
were doubtful as to his safety should he go 
to Worms, replied, " If there were as many 
devils in Worms as there are tiles on the 
housetops I would go." And when Benjamin 
Disraeli broke down in his first Parliamentary 
speech, and brought upon himself the derision 
of the House, that was an exhibition of 
germinal power when he exclaimed, * ' The day 
will come when you will consider it an honor 
to listen to me. ' ' 

When that young man, whom I knew, pass- 
ing through continual reverses and misfortunes, 
was mocked by his friends and told to desist 
from further effort, and he replied, ' ' The time 
is not far distant when you will marvel at my 
good fortune and success,' ' he showed that he 



84 The Path of Prosperity 

was possessed of that silent and irresistible 
power which has taken him over innumerable 
difficulties, and crowned his life with success. 

If you have not this power, you may acquire 
it by practice, and the beginning of power is 
likewise the beginning of wisdom. You must 
commence by overcoming those purposeless 
trivialities to which you have hitherto been 
a willing victim. Boisterous and uncontrolled 
laughter, slander and idle talk, and joking 
merely to raise a laugh, all these things must 
be put on one side as so much waste of valuable 
energy. St. Paul never showed his wonderful 
insight into the hidden laws of human pro- 
gress to greater advantage than when he 
warned the Ephesians against ' ' Foolish talking 
and jesting which is not convenient, ' ' for, to 
dwell habitually in such practices is to destroy 
all spiritual power and life. As you succeed 
in rendering yourself impervious to such mental 
dissipations you will begin to understand what 
true power is, and you will then commence to 
grapple with the more powerful desires and 
appetites which hold your soul in bondage, 
and bar the way to power, and your further 
progress will then be made clear. 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 85 

Above all be of single aim; have a legiti- 
mate and useful purpose, and devote yourself 
unreservedly to it. Let nothing draw you 
aside ; remember that " The double-minded 
man is unstable in all his ways. ' ' Be eager to 
learn, but slow to beg. Have a thorough 
understanding of your work, and let it be 
your own ; and as you proceed, ever following 
the inward Guide, the infallible Voice, you will 
pass on from victory to victory, and will rise 
step by step to higher resting-places, and your 
ever-broadening outlook will gradually reveal 
to you the essential beauty and purpose of life. 
Self -purified, health will be yours ; faith-pro- 
tected, success will be yours; self -governed, 
power will be yours, and all that you do will 
prosper, for, ceasing to be a disjointed unit, 
self -enslaved, you will be in harmony with the 
Great Law, working no longer against, but 
with, the Universal Life, the Eternal Good. 
And what health you gain it will remain with 
you; what success you achieve will be be- 
yond all human computation, and will never 
pass away; and what influence and power 
you wield will continue to increase through- 
out the ages, for it will be a part of that un- 



86 The Path of Prosperity 

changeable Principle which supports the 
universe. 

This, then, is the secret of health, — a pure 
heart and a well-ordered mind ; this is the 
secret of success, — an unfaltering faith, and 
a wisely-directed purpose; and to rein in, with 
unfaltering will, the dark steed of desire, this 
is the secret of power. 



Secret of Health, Success and Power 87 

All ways are waiting for my feet to tread, 
The light and dark, the living and the dead, 
The broad and narrow way, the high and low, 
The good and bad, and with quick step or slow, 
I now may enter any way I will, 
And find, by walking, which is good, which ill. 

And all good things my wandering feet await, 
If I but come, with vow inviolate, 
Unto the narrow, high and holy way 
Of heart-born purity, and therein stay ; 
Walking, secure from him who taunts and scorns, 
To flowery meads, across the path of thorns. 

And I may stand where health, success, and power 

Await my coming, if, each fleeting hour, 

I cling to love and patience; and abide 

With stainlessness; and never step aside 

From high integrity ; so shall I see 

At last the land of immortality. 

And I may seek and find; I may achieve; 
I may not claim, but, losing, may retrieve. 
The law bends not for me, but I must bend 
Unto the law, if I would reach the end 
Of my afflictions, if I would restore 
My soul to Light and Life, and weep no more. 

Not mine the arrogant and selfish claim 
To all good things ; be mine the lowly aim 
To seek and find, to know and comprehend, 
And wisdom-ward all holy footsteps wend. 
Nothing is mine to claim or to command, 
But all is mine to know and understand. 



THE SECRET OF ABOUNDING 
HAPPINESS 

Great is the thirst for happiness, and equally- 
great is the lack of happiness. The majority 
of the poor long for riches, believing that 
their possession would bring them supreme 
and lasting happiness. Many who are rich, 
having gratified every desire and whim, suffer 
from ennui and repletion, and are farther from 
the possession of happiness even than the very 
poor. If we reflect upon this state of things 
it will ultimately lead us to a knowledge of 
the all important truth that happiness is not 
derived from mere outward possessions, nor 
misery from the lack of them; for if this were 
so, we should find the poor always miserable, 
and the rich always happy, whereas the reverse 
is frequently the case. Some of the most 
wretched people whom I have known were 
those who were surrounded with riches and 
luxury, whilst some of the brightest and 
happiest people I have met were possessed of 

88 



The Secret of Abounding Happiness 89 

only the barest necessities of life. Many men 
who have accumulated riches have confessed 
that the selfish gratification which followed the 
acquisition of riches has robbed life of its 
sweetness, and that they were never so happy 
as when they were poor. 

What, then, is happiness, and how is it to 
be secured ? Is it a figment, a delusion, and 
is suffering alone perennial ? 

We shall find, after earnest observation and 
reflection, that all, except those who have 
entered the way of wisdom, believe that happi- 
ness is only to be obtained by the gratification 
of desire. It is this belief, rooted in the soil 
of ignorance, and continually watered by selfish 
cravings, that is the cause of all the misery in 
the world. And I do not limit the word desire 
to the grosser animal cravings; it extends to 
the higher psychic realm, where far more 
powerful, subtle, and insidious cravings hold 
in bondage the intellectual and refined, de- 
priving them of all that beauty, harmony, 
and purity of soul whose expression is happi- 
ness. 

Most people will admit that selfishness is 
the cause of all the unhappiness in the world, 



90 The Path of Prosperity 

but they fall under the soul-destroying delu- 
sion that it is somebody else's selfishness, and 
not their own. When you are willing to admit 
that all your unhappiness is the result of your 
own selfishness you will not be far from the 
gates of Paradise; but so long as you are 
convinced that it is the selfishness of others 
that is robbing you of joy, so long will you 
remain a prisoner in your self-created purga- 
tory. 

Happiness is that inward state of perfect 
satisfaction which is joy and peace, and from 
which all desire is eliminated. The satisfac- 
tion which results from gratified desire is brief 
and illusionary, and is always followed by an 
increased demand for gratification. Desire is 
as insatiable as the ocean, and clamors louder 
and louder as its demands are attended to. It 
claims ever-increasing service from its deluded 
devotees, until at last they are struck down 
with physical or mental anguish, and are 
hurled into the purifying fires of suffering. 
Desire is the region of hell, and all torments 
are centered there. The giving up of desire 
is the realization of heaven, and all delights 
await the pilgrim there. 






The Secret of Abounding Happiness 91 

4 ' I sent my soul through the invisible, 
Some letter of that after life to spell, 
And by-and-by my soul returned to me, 
And whispered, ' I myself am heaven and hell.' " 

Heaven and hell are inward states. Sink 
into self and all its gratifications, and you 
sink into hell; rise above self into that state 
of consciousness which is the utter denial and 
forgetfulness of self, and you enter heaven. 
Self is blind, without judgment, not possessed 
of true knowledge, and always leads to suffer- 
ing. Correct perception, unbiased judgment, 
and true knowledge belong only to the divine 
state, and only in so far as you realize this 
divine consciousness can you know what real 
happiness is. So long as you persist in sel- 
fishly seeking for your own personal happiness, 
so long will happiness elude you, and you 
will be sowing the seeds of wretchedness. In 
so far as you succeed in losing yourself in 
the service of others, in that measure will 
happiness come to you, and you will reap 
a harvest of bliss. 

" It is in loving, not in being loved, 
The heart is blessed ; 
It is in giving, not in seeking gifts, 
We find our quest. 



92 The Path of Prosperity 

Whatever be thy longing or thy need, 

That do thou give ; 
So shall thy soul be fed, and thou indeed 

Shalt truly live. ' ' 

Cling to self, and you cling to sorrow; re- 
linquish self, and you enter into peace. To 
seek selfishly is not only to lose happiness, 
but even that which we believe to be the 
source of happiness. See how the glutton is 
continually looking about for a new delicacy 
wherewith to stimulate his deadened appetite; 
and how, bloated, burdened, and diseased, 
scarcely any food at last is eaten with plea- 
sure. Whereas, he who has mastered his 
appetite, and not only does not seek, but 
never thinks of gustatory pleasure, finds de- 
light in the most frugal meal. The angel- 
form of happiness, which men, looking through 
the eyes of self, imagine they see in gratified 
desire, when clasped is always found to be 
the skeleton of misery. Truly, il He that 
seeketh his life shall lose it, and he that loseth 
his life shall find it. ' ' 

Abiding happiness will come to you when, 
ceasing to selfishly cling, you are willing to 
give up. When you are willing to lose, unre- 



The Secret of Abounding Happiness 93 

servedly, that impermanent thing which is so 
dear to you, and which, whether you cling to 
it or not, will one day be snatched from you, 
then you will find that that which seemed to 
you like a painful loss, turns out to be a 
supreme gain. To give up in order to gain, 
than this there is no greater delusion, nor no 
more prolific source of misery; but to be 
willing to yield up and to suffer loss, this is 
indeed the Way of Life. 

How is it possible to find real happiness by 
centering ourselves in those things which, by 
their very nature, must pass away? Abiding 
and real happiness can only be found by center- 
ing ourselves in that which is permanent. 
Rise, therefore, above the clinging to and 
the craving for impermanent things, and you 
will then enter into a consciousness of the 
Eternal, and as, rising above self, and by 
growing more and more into the spirit of 
purity, self-sacrifice and universal Love, you 
become centered in that consciousness, you 
will realize that happiness which has no re- 
action, and which can never be taken from 
you. 

The heart that has reached utter self-forget- 



94 The Path of Prosperity 

fulness in its love for others has not only be- 
come possessed of the highest happiness but 
has entered into immortality, for it has realized 
the Divine. Look back upon your life, and 
you will find that the moments of supremest 
happiness were those in which you uttered some 
word, or performed some act, of compassion or 
self-denying love. 

Spiritually, happiness and harmony are syn- 
onymous. Harmony is one phase of the Great 
Law whose spiritual expression is love. All 
selfishness is discord, and to be selfish is to be 
out of harmony with the Divine order. As we 
realize that all-embracing love which is the 
negation of self, we put ourselves in harmony 
with the divine music, the universal song, and 
that ineffable melody which is true happiness 
becomes our own. 

Men and women are rushing hither and 
thither in the blind search for happiness, and 
cannot find it; nor ever will until they recog- 
nize that happiness is already within them and 
round about them, filling the universe, and 
that they, in their selfish searching are shut- 
ting themselves out from it. 



The Secret of Abounding Happiness 95 

" I followed happiness to make her mine, 
Past towering oak and swinging ivy vine. 
She fled, I chased, o'er slanting hill and dale, 
O'er fields and meadows, in the purpling vale; 
Pursuing rapidly o'er dashing stream, 
I scaled the dizzy cliffs where eagles scream; 
I traversed swiftly every land and sea, 
But always happiness eluded me. 

" Exhausted, fainting, I pursued no more, 
But sank to rest upon a barren shore. 
One came and asked for food, and one for alms; 
I placed the bread and gold in bony palms. 
One came for sympathy, and one for rest ; 
I shared with every needy one my best; 
When, lo ! sweet Happiness, with form divine, 
Stood by me, whispering softly, ' I am thine.' " 

These beautiful lines of Burleigh's express 
the secret of all abounding happiness. Sacri- 
fice the personal and transient, and you rise 
at once into the impersonal and permanent. 
Give up that narrow cramped self that seeks 
to render all things subservient to its own 
petty interests, and you will enter into the 
company of the angels, into the very heart 
and essence of universal Love. Forget your- 
self entirely in the sorrows of others and in 
ministering to others, and divine happiness will 
emancipate you from all sorrow and suffering. 



96 The Path of Prosperity 

" Taking the first step with a good thought, 
the second with a good word, and the third 
with a good deed, I entered Paradise." And 
you also may enter into Paradise by pursuing 
the same course. It is not beyond, it is here. 
It is realized only by the unselfish. It is 
known in its fullness only to the pure in 
heart. 

If you have not realized this unbounded 
happiness you may begin to actualize it by 
ever holding before you the lofty ideal of 
unselfish love, and aspiring towards it. As- 
piration or prayer is desire turned upward. It 
is the soul turning toward its Divine source, 
where alone permanent satisfaction can be 
found. By aspiration the destructive forces 
of desire are transmuted into divine and all- 
preserving energy. To aspire is to make an 
effort to shake off the trammels of desire; 
it is the prodigal made wise by loneliness and 
suffering, returning to his Father's Mansion. 

As you rise above the sordid self; as you 
break, one after another, the chains that bind 
you, will you realize the joy of giving, as 
distinguished from the misery of grasping — 
giving of your substance; giving of your in- 



The Secret of Abounding Happiness 97 

tellect; giving of the love and light that is 
growing within you. You will then under- 
stand that it is indeed il more blessed to give 
than to receive." But the giving must be of 
the heart without any taint of self, without 
desire for reward. The gift of pure love is 
always attended with bliss. If, after you have 
given, you are wounded because you are not 
thanked or flattered, or your name put in the 
paper, know then that your gift was prompted 
by vanity and not by love, and you were 
merely giving in order to get; were not really 
giving, but grasping. 

Lose yourself in the welfare of others; for- 
get yourself in all that you do; this is the 
secret of abounding happiness. Ever be on 
the watch to guard against selfishness, and 
learn faithfully the divine lessons of inward 
sacrifice ; so shall you climb the highest heights 
of happiness, and shall remain in the never- 
clouded sunshine of universal joy, clothed in the 
shining garment of immortality. 



98 The Path of Prosperity 



Are you searching for the happiness that does not fade 

away ? 
Are you looking for the joy that lives, and leaves no 

grievous day ? 
Are you panting for the waterbrooks of Love, and Life, 

and Peace ? 
Then let all dark desires depart, and selfish seeking 

cease. 

Are you ling 'ring in the paths of pain, grief -haunted, 

stricken sore ? 
Are you wand 'ring in the ways that wound your weary 

feet the more ? 
Are you sighing for the Resting- Place where tears and 

sorrows cease ? 
Then sacrifice your selfish heart and find the H eart of 

Peace, 



THE REALIZATION OF PROSPERITY 

It is granted only to the heart that abounds 
with integrity, trust, generosity and love to 
realize true prosperity. The heart that is not 
possessed of these qualities cannot know pros- 
perity, for prosperity, like happiness, is not. an 
outward possession, but an inward realization. 
The greedy man may become a millionaire, but 
he will always be wretched, and mean, and 
poor, and will even consider himself outwardly 
poor so long as there is a man in the world 
who is richer than himself, whilst the upright, 
the open-handed and loving will realize a full 
and rich prosperity, even though their outward 
possessions may be small. " He is poor who 
is dissatisfied ; he is rich who is contented 
with what he has," and he is richer who is 
generous with what he has. 

When we contemplate the fact that the uni- 
verse is abounding in all good things, material 
as well as spiritual, and compare it with man's 
blind eagerness to secure a few gold coins, or 

99 

LOFC. 



ioo The Path of Prosperity 

a few acres of dirt, it is then that we realize 
how dark and ignorant selfishness is ; it is 
then that we know that self-seeking is self- 
destruction. 

Nature gives all, without reservation, and 
loses nothing; man, grasping all, loses every- 
thing. 

If you would realize true prosperity do not 
settle down, as many have done, into the 
belief that if you do right everything will go 
wrong. Do not allow the word " competition" 
to shake your faith in the supremacy of 
righteousness. I care not what men may say 
about the ' ' laws of competition, ' ' for do I not 
know the unchangeable Law, which shall one 
day put them all to rout, and which puts 
them to rout even now in the heart and life 
of the righteous man ? And knowing this Law 
I can contemplate all dishonesty with undis- 
turbed repose, for I know where certain de- 
struction awaits it. 

Under all circumstances do that which you 
believe to be right, and trust the Law ; trust 
the Divine Power that is imminent in the 
universe, and it will never desert you, and 
you will always be protected. By such a 



The Realization of Prosperity ioi 

trust all your losses will be converted into 
gains, and all curses which threaten will be 
transmuted into blessings. Never let go of 
integrity, generosity, and love, for these, 
coupled with energy, will lift you into the 
truly prosperous state. Do not believe the 
world when it tells you that you must always 
attend to ' ' number one ' ' first, and to others 
afterwards. To do this is not to think of 
others at all, but only of one's own comforts. 
To those who practise this the day will come 
when they will be deserted by all, and when 
they cry out in their loneliness and anguish 
there will be no one to hear and help them. 
To consider one's self before all others is to 
cramp and warp and hinder every noble and 
divine impulse. Let your soul expand, let 
your heart reach out to others in loving and 
generous warmth, and great and lasting will 
be your joy, and all prosperity will come 
to you. 

Those who have wandered from the highway 
of righteousness guard themselves against com- 
petition ; those who always pursue the right 
need not to trouble about such defence. This 
is no empty statement. There are men to-day 



102 The Path of Prosperity 

who, by the power of integrity and faith, have 
defied all competition, and who, without 
swerving in the least from their methods, 
when competed with, have risen steadily into 
prosperity, whilst those who tried to under- 
mine them have fallen back defeated. 

To possess those inward qualities which 
constitute goodness is to be armored against 
all the powers of evil, and to be doubly 
protected in every time of trial ; and to build 
oneself up in those qualities is to build up a 
success which cannot be shaken, and to enter 
into a prosperity which will endure forever. 



The Realization of Prosperity 103 



The White Robe of the Heart Invisible 

Is stained with sin and sorrow, grief and pain, 

And all repentant pools and springs of prayer 
Shall not avail to wash it white again. 

While in the path of ignorance I walk, 
The stains of error will not cease to cling ; 

Defilements mark the crooked path of self, 

Where anguish lurks and disappointments sting. 

Knowledge and wisdom only can avail 
To purify and make my garment clean, 

For therein lie love 's waters ; therein rests 
Peace undisturbed, eternal, and serene. 

Sin and repentance is the path of pain, 

Knowledge and wisdom is the path of Peace ; 

By the near way of practice I will find 

Where bliss begins, how pains and sorrows cease. 

Self shall depart, and Truth shall take its place ; 

The Changeless One, the Indivisible 
Shall take up His abode in me, and cleanse 

The White Robe of the Heart Invisible. 



PART II 
THE WAY OF PEACE 



THE POWER OF MEDITATION 

Spiritual meditation is the pathway to 
Divinity. It is the mystic ladder which 
reaches from earth to heaven, from error to 
Truth, from pain to peace. Every saint has 
climbed it; every sinner must sooner or later 
come to it, and every weary pilgrim that 
turns his back upon self and the world, and 
sets his face resolutely towards the Father's 
Home, must plant his feet upon its golden 
rounds. Without its aid you cannot grow 
into the divine state, the divine likeness, the 
divine peace, and the fadeless glories and 
unpolluting joys of Truth will remain hidden 
from you. 

Meditation is the intense dwelling, in thought, 
upon an idea or theme, with the object of 
thoroughly comprehending it, and whatsoever 
you constantly meditate upon you will not 
only come to understand, but will grow more 
and more into its likeness, for it will become 
incorporated into your very being, will become, 
107 



108 The Way of Peace 

in fact, your very self. If, therefore, you con- 
stantly dwell upon that which is selfish and 
debasing, you will ultimately become selfish 
and debased ; if you ceaselessly think upon 
that which is pure and unselfish you will 
surely become pure and unselfish. 

Tell me what that is upon which you most 
frequently and intensely think, that to which, 
in your silent hours, your soul most naturally 
turns, and I will tell you to what place of 
pain or peace you are travelling, and whether 
you are growing into the likeness of the 
divine or the bestial. 

There is an unavoidable tendency to become 
literally the embodiment of that quality upon 
which one most constantly thinks. Let, there- 
fore, the object of your meditation be above 
and not below, so that every time you revert 
to it in thought you will be lifted up; let it 
be pure and unmixed with any selfish element; 
so shall your heart become purified and drawn 
nearer to Truth, and not defiled and dragged 
more hopelessly into error. 

Meditation, in the spiritual sense in which 
I am now using it, is the secret of all 
growth in spiritual life and knowledge. Every 



The Power of Meditation 109 

prophet, sage, and savior became such by 
the power of meditation. Buddha meditated 
upon the truth until he could say, ' ' I am 
the Truth. ' ' Jesus brooded upon the Divine 
imminence until at last he could declare, "I 
and my Father are One. ' ■ 

Meditation centered upon divine realities is 
the very essence and soul of prayer. It is 
the silent reaching of the soul toward the 
Eternal. Mere petitionary prayer without 
meditation is a body without a soul, and is 
powerless to lift the mind and heart above 
sin and affliction. If you are daily praying 
for wisdom, for peace, for loftier purity and a 
fuller realization of Truth, and that for which 
you pray is still far from you, it means that 
you are praying for one thing whilst living 
out in thought and act another. If you will 
cease from such waywardness taking your 
mind off those things the selfish clinging to 
which debars you from the possession of the 
stainless realities for which you pray ; if you 
will no longer ask God to grant you that 
which you do not deserve, or to bestow upon 
you that love and compassion which you 
refuse to bestow upon others, but will com- 



no The Way of Peace 

mence to think and act in the spirit of Truth, 
you will day by day be growing into those 
realities, so that ultimately you will become 
one with them 

He who would secure any worldly advantage 
must be willing to work vigorously for it, and 
he would be foolish indeed who, waiting with 
folded hands, expected it to come to him for 
the mere asking. Do not then vainly imagine 
that you can obtain the heavenly possessions 
without making an effort. Only when you 
commence to work earnestly in the kingdom 
of Truth will you be allowed to partake of 
the Bread of Life, and when you have, by 
patient and uncomplaining effort, earned the 
spiritual wages for which you ask, they will 
not be withheld from you. 

If you really seek Truth, and not merely 
your own gratification; if you love it above 
all worldly pleasures and gains; more, even 
than happiness itself, you will be willing to 
make the effort necessary for its achievement. 

If you would be freed from sin and sorrow ; 
if you would taste of that spotless purity for 
which you sigh and pray ; if you would 
realize wisdom and knowledge, and would 



The Power of Meditation hi 

enter into the possession of profound and 
abiding peace, come now and enter the path 
of meditation, and let the supreme object of 
your meditation be Truth. 

At the outset, meditation must be distin- 
guished from idle reverie. There is nothing 
dreamy and unpractical about it. It is a 
process of searching and uncompromising thought 
which allows nothing to remain but the simple 
and naked truth. Thus meditating you will 
no longer strive to build yourself up in your 
prejudices, but, forgetting self, you will re- 
member only that you are seeking the Truth. 
And so you will remove, one by one, the errors 
which you have built around yourself in the 
past, and will patiently wait for the revelation 
of Truth which will come when your errors 
have been sufficiently removed. In the silent 
humility of your heart you will realize that 

1 ' There is an inmost center in us all 
Where Truth abides in fullness ; and around, 
Wall upon wall, the gross flesh hems it in; 
This perfect, clear perception, which is Truth, 
A baffling and perverting carnal mesh 
Blinds it, and makes all error ; and to know, 
Rather consists in opening out a way 
Whence the imprisoned splendor may escape, 



ii2 The Way of Peace 

Than in effecting entry for a light 
Supposed to be without.* .! 

Select some portion of the day in which to 
meditate, and keep that period sacred to your 
purpose. The best time is the very early 
morning when the spirit of repose is upon 
everything. All natural conditions will then 
be in your favor; the passions, after the long 
bodily fast of the night, will be subdued, the 
excitements and worries of the previous day 
will have died away, and the mind, strong and 
yet restful, will be receptive to spiritual in- 
struction. Indeed, one of the first efforts you 
will be called upon to make will be to shake 
off lethargy and indulgence, and if you refuse 
you will be unable to advance, for the demands 
of the spirit are imperative. 

To be spiritually awakened is also to be 
mentally and physically awakened. The slug- 
gard and the self-indulgent can have no knowl- 
edge of Truth. He who, possessed of health 
and strength, wastes the calm, precious hours 
of the silent morning in drowsy indulgence is 
totally unfit to climb the heavenly heights. 

He whose awakening consciousness has be- 
come alive to its lofty possibilities, who is 



The Power of Meditation 113 

beginning to shake off the darkness of ignor- 
ance in which the world is enveloped, rises 
before the stars have ceased their vigil, and, 
grappling with the darkness within his soul, 
strives, by holy aspiration, to perceive the 
light of Truth while the unawakened world 
dreams on. 

1 * The heights by great men reached and kept, 
Were not attained by sudden flight, 
But they, while their companions slept, 
Were toiling upward in the night. ' . 

No saint, no holy man, no teacher of Truth 
ever lived who did not rise early in the morn- 
ing. Jesus habitually rose early, and climbed 
the solitary mountains to engage in holy com- 
munion. Buddha always rose an hour before 
sunrise and engaged in meditation, and all his 
disciples were enjoined to do the same. 

If you have to commence your daily duties 
at a very early hour, and are thus debarred 
from giving the early morning to systematic 
meditation, try to give an hour at night, and 
should this, by the length and laboriousness 
of your daily task be denied you, you need 
not despair, for you may turn your thoughts 



ii4 The Way of Peace 

upward in holy meditation in the intervals of 
your work, or in those few idle minutes which 
you now waste in aimlessness ; and should 
your work be of that kind which becomes 
by practice automatic, you may meditate while 
engaged upon it. That eminent Christian saint 
and philosopher, Jacob Boehme, realized his 
vast knowledge of divine things whilst work- 
ing long hours as a shoemaker. In every life 
there is time to think, and the busiest, the 
most laborious is not shut out from aspiration 
and meditation. 

Spiritual meditation and self-discipline are 
inseparable; you will therefore, commence to 
meditate upon yourself, so as to try and under- 
stand yourself, for, remember, the great object 
you will have in view will be the complete 
removal of all your errors in order that you 
may realize Truth. You will begin to question 
your motives, thoughts, and acts, comparing 
them with your ideal, and endeavoring to 
look upon them with a calm and impartial 
eye. In this manner you will be continually 
gaining more of that mental and spiritual 
equilibrium without which men are but help- 
less straws upon the ocean of life. If you are 



The Power of Meditation 115 

given to hatred or anger you will meditate 
upon gentleness and forgiveness, so as to be- 
come actually alive to a sense of your harsh 
and foolish conduct. You will then begin to 
dwell in thoughts of love, of gentleness, of 
abounding forgiveness; and as you overcome 
the lower by the higher, there will gradually, 
silently steal into your heart a knowledge of 
the Divine Law of Love with an understanding 
of its bearing upon all the intricacies of life 
and conduct. And in applying this knowledge 
to your every thought, word, and act, you will 
grow more and more gentle, more and more 
loving, more and more divine. And thus with 
every error, every selfish desire, every human 
weakness; by the power of meditation is it 
overcome, and as each sin, each error is thrust 
out, a fuller and clearer measure of the Light 
of Truth illumines the pilgrim soul. 

Thus meditating, you will be ceaselessly 
fortifying yourself against your only real 
enemy, your selfish, perishable self, and will 
be establishing yourself more and more firmly 
in the divine and imperishable self that is 
inseparable from Truth. The direct outcome 
of your meditations will be a calm, spiritual 



n6 The Way of Peace 

strength which will be your stay and resting- 
place in the struggle of life. Great is the 
overcoming power of holy thought, and the 
strength and knowledge gained in the hour of 
silent meditation will enrich the soul with 
saving remembrance in the hour of strife, of 
sorrow, or of temptation. 

As, by the power of meditation, you grow 
in wisdom, you will relinquish, more and more, 
your selfish desires which are fickle, imper- 
manent, and productive of sorrow and pain; 
and will take your stand, with increasing stead- 
fastness and trust, upon unchangeable prin- 
ciples, and will realize heavenly rest. 

The use of meditation is the acquirement 
of a knowledge of eternal principles, and the 
power which results from meditation is the 
ability to rest upon and trust those principles, 
and so become one with the Eternal. The 
end of meditation is, therefore, direct knowl- 
edge of Truth, God, and the realization of 
divine and profound peace. 

Let your meditations take their rise from 
the ethical ground which you now occupy. 
Remember that you are to grow into Truth 
by steady perseverance. If you are an ortho- 



The Power of Meditation 117 

dox Christian, meditate ceaselessly upon the 
spotless purity and divine excellence of the 
character of Jesus, and apply his every precept 
to your inner life and outward conduct, so as 
to approximate more and more toward his per- 
fection. Do not be as those religious ones, 
who, refusing to meditate upon the Law of 
Truth, and to put into practice the precepts 
given to them by their Master, are content to 
formally worship, to cling to their particular 
creeds, and to continue in the ceaseless round 
of sin and suffering. Strive to rise, by the 
power of meditation, above all selfish clinging 
to partial gods or party creeds; above dead 
formalities and lifeless ignorance. Thus walk- 
ing the highway of wisdom, with mind fixed 
upon the spotless Truth, you shall know no 
halting place short of the realization of Truth. 
He who earnestly meditates first perceives 
a truth, as it were, afar off, and then realizes 
it by daily practice. It is only the doer of 
the Word of Truth that can know of the 
doctrine of Truth, for though by pure thought 
the Truth is perceived, it is only actualized by 
practice. 

Said the divine Gautama, the Buddha, " He 



n8 The Way of Peace 

who gives himself up to vanity, and does not 
give himself up to meditation, forgetting the 
real aim of life and grasping at pleasure, will 
in time envy him who has exerted himself in 
meditation, ' ' and he instructed his disciples in 
the following " Five Great Meditations": — 

"The first meditation is the meditation of 
love, in which you so adjust your heart that 
you long for the weal and welfare of all beings, 
including the happiness of your enemies. 

11 The second meditation is the meditation 
of pity, in which you think of all beings in 
distress, vividly representing in your imagin- 
ation their sorrows and anxieties so as to 
arouse a deep compassion for them in your 
soul. 

" The third meditation is the meditation of 
joy, in which you think of the prosperity of 
others, and rejoice with their rejoicings. 

/'The fourth meditation is the meditation 
of impurity, in which you consider the evil 
consequences of corruption, the effects of sin 
and diseases. How trivial often the pleasure 
of the moment, and how fatal its consequeftces. 

11 The fifth meditation is the meditation on 
serenity, in which you rise above love and 



The Power of Meditation 119 

hate, tyranny and oppression, wealth and want, 
and regard your own fate with impartial calm- 
ness and perfect tranquillity." 

By engaging in these meditations the dis- 
ciples of the Buddha arrived at a knowledge 
of the Truth. But whether you engage in 
these particular meditations or not matters 
little so long as your object is Truth, so long 
as you hunger and thirst for that righteous- 
ness which is a holy heart and a blameless 
life. In your meditations, therefore, let your 
heart grow and expand with ever-broadening 
love, until, free from all hatred, and passion, 
and condemnation, it embraces the whole uni- 
verse with thoughtful tenderness. As the 
flower opens its petals to receive the morning 
light, so open your soul more and more to 
the glorious light of Truth. Soar upward 
upon the wings of aspiration; be fearless, and 
believe in the loftiest possibilities. Believe that 
a life of absolute meekness is possible; believe 
that a life of stainless purity is possible; be- 
lieve that a life of perfect holiness is possible ; 
believe that the realization of the highest truth 
is possible. He who so believes, climbs rapidly 
the heavenly hills, whilst the unbelievers con- 



120 The Way of Peace 

tinue to grope darkly and painfully in the 
fog-bound valleys. 

So believing, so aspiring, so meditating, 
divinely sweet and beautiful will be your 
spiritual experiences, and glorious the revela- 
tions that will enrapture your inward vision. 
As you realize the divine Love, the divine 
Justice, the divine Purity, the Perfect Law 
of Good, or God, great will be your bliss and 
deep your peace. Old things will pass away, 
and all things will become new. The veil of 
the material universe, so dense and impene- 
trable to the eye of error, so thin and gauzy 
to the eye of Truth, will be lifted and the 
spiritual universe will be revealed. Time will 
cease, and you will live only in Eternity. 
Change and mortality will no more cause you 
anxiety and sorrow, for you will become estab- 
lished in the unchangeable, and will dwell in 
the very heart of immortality. 



The Power of Meditation 121 



STAR OF WISDOM 

Star that of the birth of Vishnu, 

Birth of Krishna, Buddha, Jesus, 

Told the wise ones, Heavenward looking, 

Waiting, watching for thy gleaming 

In the darkness of the night-time, 

In the starless gloom of midnight ; 

Shining Herald of the coming 

Of the kingdom of the righteous ; 

Teller of the Mystic story 

Of the lowly birth of Godhead 

In the stable of the passions, 

In the manger of the mind-soul ; 

Silent singer of the secret 

Of compassion deep and holy 

To the heart with sorrow burdened, 

To the soul with waiting weary :- 

Star of all -surpassing brightness, 

Thou again dost deck the midnight ; 

Thou again dost cheer the wise ones 

Watching in the creedal darkness, 

Weary of the endless battle 

With the grinding blades of error ; 

Tired of lifeless, useless idols, 

Of the dead forms of religions ; 

Spent with watching for thy shining ; 

Thou hast ended their despairing ; 

Thou hast lighted up their pathway ; 

Thou hast brought again the old Truths 

To the hearts of all thy Watchers ; 

To the souls of them that love thee 



122 The Way of Peace 

Thou dost speak of Joy and Gladness, 
Of the peace that comes of Sorrow. 
Blessed are they that can see thee, 
Weary wanderers in the Night-time ; 
Blessed they who feel the throbbing, 
In their bosoms feel the pulsing 
Of a deep Love stirred within them 
By the great power of thy shining. 
Let us learn thy lesson truly ; 
Learn it faithfully and humbly ; 
Learn it meekly, wisely, gladly, 
Ancient Star of holy Vishnu, 
Light of Krishna, Buddha, Jesus. 



THE TWO MASTERS, SELF AND 
TRUTH 

Upon the battlefield of the human soul two 
masters are ever contending for the crown of 
supremacy, for the kingship and dominion 
of the heart ; the master of self, called also the 
11 Prince of this world," and the master of 
Truth, called also the Father God. The master 
self is that rebellious one whose weapons are 
passion, pride, avarice, vanity, self-will, im- 
plements of darkness ; the master Truth is 
that meek and lowly one whose weapons are 
gentleness, patience, purity, sacrifice, humility, 
love, instruments of Light. 

In every soul the battle is waged, and as a 
soldier cannot engage at once in two opposing 
armies, so every heart is enlisted either in the 
ranks of self or of Truth. There is no half- 
and-half course; "There is self and there is 
Truth; where self is, Truth is not, where 
Truth is, self is not." Thus spake Buddha, 
the teacher of Truth, and Jesus, the manifested 

125 



124 The Way of Peace 

Christ, declared that ' ' No man can serve two 
masters; for either he will hate the one and 
love the other ; or else he will hold to the one 
and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God 
and Mammon. ' ' 

Truth is so simple, so absolutely undeviating 
and uncompromising that it admits of no com- 
plexity, no turning, no qualification. Self is 
ingenious, crooked, and, governed by subtle 
and snaky desire, admits of endless turnings 
and qualifications, and the deluded worshippers 
of self vainly imagine that they can gratify 
every worldly desire, and at the same time 
possess the Truth. But the lovers of Truth 
worship Truth with the sacrifice of self, and 
ceaselessly guard themselves against worldliness 
and self-seeking. 

Do you seek to know and to realize Truth ? 
Then you must be prepared to sacrifice, to re- 
nounce to the uttermost, for Truth in all its 
glory can only be perceived and known when 
the last vestige of self has disappeared. 

The eternal Christ declared that he who 
would be His disciple must " deny himself 
daily. " Are you willing to deny yourself, to 
give up your lusts, your prejudices, your 



The Two Masters, Self and Truth 125 

opinions ? If so, you may enter the narrow 
way of Truth, and find that peace from which 
the world is shut out. The absolute denial, 
the utter extinction, of self is the perfect state 
of Truth, and all religions and philosophies 
are but so many aids to this supreme attain- 
ment. 

Self is the denial of Truth. Truth is the 
denial of self. As you let self die, you will be 
reborn in Truth. As you cling to self, Truth 
will be hidden from you. 

Whilst you cling to self, your path will be 
beset with difficulties, and repeated pains, 
sorrows, and disappointments will be your 
lot. There are no difficulties in Truth, and 
coming to Truth, you will be freed from all 
sorrow and disappointment. 

Truth in itself is not hidden and dark. It 
is always revealed and is perfectly transparent. 
But the blind and wayward self cannot perceive 
it. The light of day is not hidden except to 
the blind, and the Light of Truth is not hidden 
except to those who are blinded by self. 

Truth is the one Reality in the universe, 
the inward Harmony, the perfect Justice, the 
eternal Love. Nothing can be added to it, 



126 The Way of Peace 

nor taken from it. It does not depend upon 
any man, but all men depend upon it. You 
cannot perceive the beauty of Truth while you 
are looking out through the eyes of self. If 
you are vain, you will color everything with 
your own vanities. If lustful, your heart and 
mind will be so clouded with the smoke and 
flames of passion, that everything will appear 
distorted through them. If proud and opiniona- 
tive, you will see nothing in the whole universe 
except the magnitude and importance of your 
own opinions. 

There is one quality which pre-eminently 
distinguishes the man of Truth from the man 
of self, and that is humility. To be not only 
free from vanity, stubbornness and egotism, 
but to regard one's own opinions as of no value, 
this indeed is true humility. 

He who is immersed in self regards his own 
opinions as Truth, and the opinions of other 
men as error. But that humble Truth-lover 
who has learned to distinguish between opinion 
and Truth, regards all men with the eye of 
charity, and does not seek to defend his 
opinions against theirs, but sacrifices those 
opinions that he may love the more, that he 



The Two Masters, Self and Truth 127 

may manifest the spirit of Truth, for Truth 
in its very nature is ineffable and can only 
be lived. He who has most of charity has 
most of Truth. 

Men engage in heated controversies, and 
foolishly imagine they are defending the Truth, 
when in reality they are pierely defending their 
own petty interests and perishable opinions. 
The follower of self takes up arms against 
others. The follower of Truth takes up arms 
against himself. Truth, being unchangeable 
and eternal, is independent of your opinion 
and of mine. We may enter into it, or we 
may stay outside; but both our defence and 
our attack are superfluous, and are hurled back 
upon ourselves. 

Men, enslaved by self, passionate, proud, 
and condemnatory, believe their particular 
creed or religion to be the Truth, and all other 
religions to be error ; and they proselytize with 
passionate ardor. There is but one religion, 
the religion of Truth. There is but one error, 
the error of self. Truth is not a formal belief; 
it is an unselfish, holy, and aspiring heart, and 
he who has Truth is at peace with all, and 
cherishes all with thoughts of love. 



128 The Way of Peace 

You may easily know whether you are a 
child of Truth or a worshipper of self, if you 
will silently examine your mind, heart, and 
conduct. Do you harbor thoughts of sus- 
picion, enmity, envy, lust, pride, or do you 
strenuously fight against these ? If the former, 
you are chained to self, no matter what re- 
ligion you may profess; if the latter, you are 
a candidate for Truth, even though outwardly 
you may profess no religion. Are you pas- 
sionate, self-willed, ever seeking to gain your 
own ends, self-indulgent, and self -centered ; or 
are you gentle, mild, unselfish, quit of every 
form of self-indulgence, and are ever ready to 
give up your own? If the former, self is your 
master ; if the latter, Truth is the object of 
your affection. Do you strive for riches ? Do 
you fight, with passion, for your party ? Do 
you lust for power and leadership ? Are you 
given to ostentation and self-praise? Or have 
you given up the love of riches? Have you 
relinquished all strife ? Are you content to 
take the lowest place, and to be passed by 
unnoticed? And have you ceased to talk 
about yourself and to regard yourself with 
self-complacent pride ? If the former, even 



The Two Masters, Self and Truth 129 

though you may imagine you worship God, 
the god of your heart is self. If the latter, 
even though you may withhold you Hps from 
worship, you are dwelling with the Most High. 
The signs by which the Truth-lover is known 
are unmistakable. Hear the Holy Krishna 
declare them, in Sir Edwin Arnold's beautiful 
rendering of the ' ' Bhavagad Gita ' ' 

' ' Fearlessness, singleness of soul, the will 
Always to strive for wisdom ; opened hand 
And governed appetites; and piety, 
And love of lonely study; humbleness, 
Uprightness, heed to injure nought which lives, 
Truthfulness, slowness unto wrath, a mind 
That lightly letteth go what others prize ; 
And equanimity, and charity 
Which spieth no man's faults; and tenderness 
Towards all that suffer ; a contented heart, 
Fluttered by no desires; a bearing mild, 
Modest and grave, with manhood nobly mixed, 
With patience, fortitude and purity ; 
An unrevengeful spirit, never given 
To rate itself too high — such be the signs, 
O Indian Prince ! of him whose feet are set 
On that fair path which leads to heavenly birth ! " 

When men, lost in the devious ways of 
error and self, have forgotten the ,< heavenly 
birth," the state of holiness and Truth, they 



130 The Way of Peace 

set up artificial standards by which to judge 
one another, and make acceptance of, and 
adherence to, their own particular theology, 
the test of Truth ; and so men are divided 
one against another, and there is ceaseless 
enmity and strife, and unending sorrow and 
suffering. 

Reader, do you seek to realize the birth into 
Truth ? There is only one way : Let self die. 
All those lusts, appetites, desires, opinions, 
limited conceptions and prejudices to which 
you have hitherto so tenaciously clung, let 
them fall from you. Let them no longer hold 
you in bondage, and Truth will be yours. 
Cease to look upon your own religion as 
superior to all others, and strive humbly to 
learn the supreme lesson of charity. No 
longer cling to the idea, so productive of strife 
and sorrow, that the Savior whom you wor- 
ship is the only Savior, and that the Savior 
whom your brother worships with equal sin- 
cerity and ardor, is an imposter; but seek 
diligently the path of holiness, and then you 
will realize that every holy man is a savior 
of mankind. 

The giving up of self is not merely the 



The Two Masters, Self and Truth 131 

renunciation of outward things. It consists of 
the renunciation of the inward sin, the inward 
error. Not by giving up vain clothing; not 
by relinquishing riches, not by abstaining 
from certain foods; not by speaking smooth 
words ; not by merely doing these things is 
the Truth found; but by giving up the spirit 
of vanity; by relinquishing the desire for 
riches; by abstaining from the lust of self 
indulgence; by giving up all hatred, strife, 
condemnation, and self-seeking, and becoming 
gentle and pure at heart; by doing these 
things is the Truth found. To do the former, 
and not to do the latter, is pharisaism and 
hypocrisy, whereas the latter includes the 
former. You may renounce the outward 
world, and isolate yourself in a cave or in 
the depths of a forest, but you will take all 
your selfishness with you, and unless you 
renounce that, great indeed will be your 
wretchedness and deep your delusion. You 
may remain just where you are, performing 
all your duties, and yet renounce the world, 
the inward enemy. To be in the world and 
yet not of the world is the highest perfection, 
the most blessed peace, is to achieve the 



132 The Way of Peace 

greatest victory. The renunciation of self is 
the way of Truth, therefore, 

1 ' Enter the Path ; there is no grief like hate, 
No pain like passion, no deceit like sense ; 
Enter the Path ; far hath he gone whose foot 
Treads down one fond offence. ' ' 

As you succeed in overcoming self you will 
begin to see things in their right relations. 
He who is swayed by any passions, prejudice, 
like or dislike, adjusts everything to that 
particular bias, and sees only his own delu- 
sions. He who is absolutely free from all 
passion, prejudice, preference, and partiality, 
sees himself as he is; sees others as they are; 
sees all things in their proper proportions and 
right relations. Having nothing to attack, 
nothing to defend, nothing to conceal, and no 
interests to guard, he is at peace. He has 
realized the profound simplicity of Truth, for 
this unbiased, tranquil, blessed state of mind 
and heart is the state of Truth. He who 
attains to it dwells with the angels, and sits 
at the footstool of the Supreme. Knowing 
the Great Law; knowing the origin of sorrow; 
knowing the secret of suffering; knowing the 



The Two Masters, Self and Truth 133 

way of emancipation in Truth, how can such 
a one engage in strife or condemnation; for 
though he knows that the blind, self-seeking 
world, surrounded with the clouds of its own 
illusions, and enveloped in the darkness of 
error and self, cannot perceive the stead- 
fast Light of Truth, and is utterly incapable 
of comprehending the profound simplicity of 
the heart that has died, or is dying, to self, 
yet he also knows that when the suffering 
ages have piled up mountains of sorrow, the 
crushed and burdened soul of the world will 
fly to its final refuge, and that when the ages 
are completed, every prodigal will come back 
to the fold of Truth. And so he dwells in 
good will towards all, and regards all with that 
tender compassion which a father bestows 
upon his wayward children. 

Men cannot understand Truth because they 
cling to self, because they. believe in and love 
self, because they believe self to be the only 
reality, whereas it is the one delusion. 

When you cease to believe in and love self 
you will desert it, and will fly to Truth, and 
will find the Eternal Reality. 

When men are intoxicated with the wines 



134 The Way of Peace 

of luxury, and pleasure, and vanity, the thirst 
of life grows and deepens within them, and 
they delude themselves with dreams of fleshly 
immortality, but when they come to reap the 
harvest of their own sowing, and pain and 
sorrow supervene, then, crushed and humili- 
ated, relinquishing self and all the intoxica- 
tions of self, they come, with aching hearts 
to the one immortality, the immortality that 
destroys all delusions, the spiritual immortality 
in Truth. 

Men pass from evil to good, from self to 
Truth, through the dark gate of sorrow, for 
sorrow and self are inseparable. Only in the 
peace and bliss of Truth is all sorrow van- 
quished. If you suffer disappointment because 
your cherished plans have been thwarted, or 
because some one has not come up to your 
anticipations, it is because you are clinging 
to self. If you suffer remorse for your con- 
duct, it is because you have given way to self. 
If you are overwhelmed with chagrin and 
regret because of the attitude of some one else 
toward you, it is because you have been 
cherishing self. If you are wounded on ac- 
count of what has been done to you or said 



The Two Masters, Self and Truth 135 

of you, it is because you are walking in the 
painful way of self. All suffering is of self. 
All suffering ends in Truth. When you have 
entered into and realized Truth, you will no 
longer suffer disappointment, remorse and 
regret, and sorrow will flee from you. 

" Self is the only prison that can ever bind the soul; 

Truth is the only angel that can bid the gates unroll; 

And when he comes to call thee, arise and follow fast; 

His way may lie through darkness, but it leads to 

light at last. ' ' 

The woe of the world is of its own making. 
Sorrow purifies and deepens the soul, and the 
extremity of sorrow is the prelude to Truth. 

Have you suffered much ? Have you sor- 
rowed deeply ? Have you pondered seriously 
upon the problem of life ? If so, you are pre- 
pared to wage war against self, and to become 
a disciple of Truth. 

The intellectual who do not see the neces- 
sity for giving up self, frame endless theories 
about the universe, and call them Truth; but 
do thou pursue that direct line of conduct 
which is the practice of righteousness, and thou 
wilt realize the Truth which has no place in 
theory, and which never changes. Cultivate 



136 The Way of Peace 

your heart. Water it continually with unsel- 
fish love and deep-felt pity, and strive to shut 
out from it all thoughts and feelings which are 
not in accordance with Love. Return good 
for evil, love for hatred, gentleness for ill- 
treatment, and remain silent when attacked. 
So shall you transmute all your selfish desires 
into the pure gold of Love, and self will dis- 
appear in Truth. So will you walk blame- 
lessly amongst men, yoked with the easy yoke 
of lowliness, and clothed with the divine gar- 
ment of humility. 



The Two Masters, Self and Truth 137 

O come, weary brother ! thy struggling and striving 
End thou in the heart of the Master of Truth ; 

Across self 's drear desert why wilt thou be driving, 
A thirst for the quickening waters of Truth. 

When here, by the path of thy searching and sinning, 
Flows Life 's gladsome stream, lies Love's oasis green? 

Come, turn thou and rest; know the end and beginning, 
The sought and the searcher, the seer and seen. 

Thy Master sits not in the unapproached mountains, 
Nor dwells in the mirage which floats on the air, 

Nor shalt thou discover His magical fountains 
In pathways of sand that encircle despair. 

In selfhood 's dark desert cease wearily seeking 
The odorous tracks of the feet of thy King ; 

And if thou wouldst hear the sweet sound of His 
speaking, 
Be deaf to all voices that emptily sing. 

Flee the vanishing places; renounce all thou hast; 

Leave all that thou lovest, and, naked and bare, 
Thyself at the shrine of the Innermost cast ; 

The Highest, the Holiest, the Changeless is there. 

Within, in the heart of the Silence He dwelleth ; 

Leave sorrow and sin, leave thy wanderings sore; 
Come bathe in His Joy, whilst He, whispering, telleth 

Thy soul what it seeketh, and wander no more. 

Then cease, weary brother, thy struggling and striving; 

Find peace in the heart of the Master of Truth ; 
Across self's dark desert cease wearily driving ; 

Come ; drink at the beautiful waters of Truth. 



THE ACQUIREMENT OF SPIRITUAL 
POWER 

The world is filled with men and women 
seeking pleasure, excitement, novelty; seeking 
ever to be moved to laughter or tears ; not 
seeking strength, stability, and power; but 
courting weakness, and eagerly engaged in 
dispersing what power they have. 

Men and women of real power and influence 
are few, because few are prepared to make the 
sacrifice necessary to the acquirement of power, 
and fewer still are ready to patiently build up 
character. 

To be swayed by your fluctuating thoughts 
and impulses is to be weak and powerless; to 
rightly control and direct those forces is to be 
strong and powerful. Men of strong animal 
passions have much of the ferocity of the 
beast, but this is not power. The elements 
of power are there ; but it is only when this 
ferocity is tamed and subdued by the higher 
intelligence that real power begins; and men 

138 



The Acquirement of Spiritual Power 139 

can only grow in power by awakening them- 
selves to higher and ever higher states of in- 
telligence and consciousness. 

The difference between a man of weakness 
and one of power lies not in the strength of 
the personal will ( for the stubborn man is 
usually weak and foolish), but in that focus 
of consciousness which represents their states 
of knowledge. 

The pleasure-seekers, the lovers of excite- 
ment, the hunters after novelty, and the victims 
of impulse and hysterical emotion lack that 
knowledge of principles which gives balance, 
stability and influence. 

A man commences to develop power when, 
checking his impulses and selfish inclinations, 
he falls back upon the higher and calmer con- 
sciousness within him, and begins to steady 
himself upon a principle. 

The realization of unchanging principles in 
consciousness is at once the source and secret 
of the highest power. 

When, after much searching, and suffering, 
and sacrificing, the light of an eternal principle 
dawns upon the soul, a divine calm ensues and 
joy unspeakable gladdens the heart. 



140 The Way of Peace 

He who has realized such a principle ceases 
to wander, and remains poised and self- 
possessed. He ceases to be ' ' passion's slave, ' ' 
and becomes a master-builder in the Temple 
of Destiny. 

The man that is governed by self, and not 
by a principle, changes his front when his 
selfish comforts are threatened. Deeply intent 
upon defending and guarding his own interests, 
he regards all means as lawful that will sub- 
serve that end. He is continually scheming 
as to how he may protect himself against his 
enemies, being too self -centered to perceive 
that he is his own enemy. Such a man 's work 
crumbles away, for it is divorced from Truth 
and power. All effort that is grounded upon 
self, perishes; only that work endures that is 
built upon an indestructible principle. 

The man that stands upon a principle is 
the same calm, dauntless, self-possessed man 
under all circumstances. When the hour of 
trial comes, and he has to decide between his 
personal comforts and Truth, he gives up his 
comforts and remains firm. Even the prospect 
of torture and death cannot alter or deter him. 
The man of self regards the loss of his wealth, 



The Acquirement of Spiritual Power 141 

his comforts, or his life as the greatest calami- 
ties which can befall him. The man of 
principle looks upon these incidents as com- 
paratively insignificant, and not to be weighed 
with loss of character, loss of Truth. To desert 
Truth is, to him, the only happening which 
can really be called a calamity. 

It is the hour of crisis which decides who 
are the minions of darkness, and who the 
children of light, It is the epoch of threaten- 
ing disaster, ruin, and persecution which divides 
the sheep from the goats, and reveals to the 
reverential gaze of succeeding ages the men 
and women of power. 

It is easy for a man, so long as he is left 
in the enjoyment of his possessions, to per- 
suade himself that he believes in and adheres 
to the principles of Peace, Brotherhood, and 
Universal Love; but if, when his enjoy- 
ments are threatened, or he imagines they are 
threatened, he begins to clamor loudly for 
war, he shows that he believes in and stands 
upon, not Peace, Brotherhood, and Love, but 
strife, selfishness, and hatred. 

He who does not desert his principles when 
threatened with the loss of every earthly thing, 



142 The Way of Peace 

even to the loss of reputation and life, is the 
man of power ; is the man whose every word 
and work endures ; is the man whom the after- 
world honors, reveres, and worships. Rather 
than desert that principle of Divine Love on 
which he rested, and in which all his trust 
was placed, Jesus endured the utmost extremity 
of agony and deprivation; and to-day the 
world prostrates itself at his pierced feet in 
rapt adoration. 

There is no way to the acquirement of 
spiritual power except by that inward illu- 
mination and enlightenment which is the 
realization of spiritual principles; and those 
principles can only be realized by constant 
practice and application. 

Take the principle of divine Love, and 
quietly and diligently meditate upon it with 
the object of arriving at a thorough under- 
standing of it. Bring its searching light to 
bear upon all your habits, your actions, your 
speech and intercourse with others, your every 
secret thought and desire. As you persevere 
in this course, the divine Love will become 
more and more perfectly revealed to you, and 
your own shortcomings will stand out in more 



The Acquirement of Spiritual Power 143 

and more vivid contrast, spurring you on to 
renewed endeavor; and having once caught 
a glimpse of the incomparable majesty of that 
imperishable principle, you will never again 
rest in your weakness, your selfishness, your 
imperfection, but will pursue that Love until 
you have relinquished every discordant element, 
and have brought yourself into perfect harmony 
with it. And that state of inward harmony 
is spiritual power. Take also other spiritual 
principles, such as Purity and Compassion, 
and apply them in the same way, and, so ex- 
acting is Truth, you will be able to make no 
stay, no resting-place until the inmost garment 
of your soul is bereft of every stain, and your 
heart has become incapable of any hard, con- 
demnatory, and pitiless impulse. 

Only in so far as you understand, realize 
and rely upon, these principles, will you ac- 
quire spiritual power, and that power will be 
manifested in and through you in the form of 
increasing dispassion, patience and equanimity. 

Dispassion argues superior self-control ; sub- 
lime patience is the very hall-mark of divine 
knowledge, and to retain an unbroken calm 
amid all the duties and distractions of life, 



144 The Way of Peace 

marks off the man of power. ' 4 It is easy in 
the world to live after the world's opinion; it 
is easy in solitude to live after our own; but 
the great man is he who in the midst of the 
crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the inde- 
pendence of solitude. ' ' 

Some mystics hold that perfection in dis- 
passion is the source of that power by which 
miracles (so-called) are performed, and truly 
he who has gained such perfect control of all 
his interior forces that no shock, however great, 
can for one moment unbalance him, must be 
capable of guiding and directing those forces 
with a master-hand. 

To grow in self-control, in patience, in 
equanimity, is to grow in strength and power; 
and you can only thus grow by focusing your 
consciousness upon a principle. As a child, 
after making many and vigorous attempts to 
walk unaided, at last succeeds, after numerous 
falls, in accomplishing this, so you must enter 
the way of power by first attempting to stand 
alone. Break away from the tyranny of custom, 
tradition, conventionality, and the opinions of 
others, until you succeed in walking lonely 
and erect amongst men. Rely upon your own 



The Acquirement of Spiritual Power 145 

judgment; be true to your own conscience; 
follow the Light that is within you; all out- 
ward lights are so many will-o'-the-wisps. 
There will be those who will tell you that 
you are foolish ; that your judgment is faulty ; 
that your conscience is all awry, and that the 
Light within you is darkness; but heed them 
not If what they say is true the sooner you, 
as a searcher for wisdom, find it out the better, 
and you can only make the discovery by bring- 
ing your powers to the test. Therefore, pur- 
sue your course bravely. Your conscience is 
at least your own, and to follow it is to be 
a man; to follow the conscience of another is 
to be a slave. You will have many falls, will 
suffer many wounds, will endure many buffet- 
ings for a time, but press on in faith, believing 
that sure and certain victory lies ahead. Search 
for a rock, a principle, and having found it cling 
to it; get it under your feet and stand erect 
upon it, until at last, immovably fixed upon it, 
you succeed in defying the fury of the waves 
and storms of selfishness. 

For selfishness in any and every form is 
dissipation, weakness, death; unselfishness in 
its spiritual aspect is conservation, power, life. 



146 The Way of Peace 

As you grow in spiritual life, and become estab- 
lished upon principles, you will become as 
beautiful and as unchangeable as those prin- 
ciples, will taste of the sweetness of their im- 
mortal essence, and will realize the eternal and 
indestructible nature of the God within. 



The Acquirement of Spiritual Power 147 



No harmful shaft can reach the righteous man, 
Standing erect amid the storms of hate, 

Defying hurt and injury and ban, 

Surrounded by the trembling slaves of Fate. 

Majestic in the strength of silent power, 

Serene he stands, nor changes not nor turns; 

Patient and firm in suffering's darkest hour, 

Time bends to him, and death and doom he spurns. 

Wrath's lurid lightnings round about him play, 
And hell 's deep thunders roll about his head ; 

Yet heeds he not, for him they cannot slay 

Who stands whence earth and time and space are fled. 

Sheltered by deathless love, what fear hath he ? 

Armored in changeless Truth, what can he know 
Of loss and gain ? Knowing eternity, 

He moves not whilst the shadows come and go. 

Call him immortal, call him Truth and Light 

And splendor of prophetic majesty 
Who bideth thus amid the powers of night, 

Clothed with the glory of divinity. 



THE REALIZATION OF SELFLESS 
LOVE 

It is said that Michael Angelo saw in every 
rough block of stone a thing of beauty await- 
ing the master-hand to bring it into reality. 
Even so, within each there reposes the Divine 
Image awaiting the master-hand of Faith and 
the chisel of Patience to bring it into mani- 
festation. And that divine Image is revealed 
and realized as stainless, selfless Love. 

Hidden deep in every human heart, though 
frequently covered up with a mass of hard 
and almost impenetrable accretions, is the 
spirit of Divine Love, whose holy and spot- 
less essence is undying and eternal. It is the 
Truth in man; it is that which belongs to 
the Supreme: that which is real and immortal. 
All else changes and passes away; this alone 
is permanent and imperishable; and to realize 
this Love by ceaseless diligence in the practice 
of the highest righteousness, to live in it and 
to become fully conscious in it, is to enter 

148 



The Realization of Selfless Love 149 

into immortality here and now, is to become 
one with Truth, one with God, one with the 
central Heart of all things, and to know our 
own divine and eternal nature. 

To reach this Love, to understand and ex- 
perience it, one must work with great persist- 
ency and diligence upon his heart and mind, 
must ever renew his patience and keep strong 
his faith, for there will be much to remove, 
much to accomplish before the divine image 
is revealed in all its glorious beauty. 

He who strives to reach and to accomplish 
the divine will be tried to the very uttermost; 
and this is absolutely necessary, for how else 
could one acquire that sublime patience with- 
out which there is no real wisdom, no divinity ? 
Ever and anon, as he proceeds, all his work 
will seem to be futile, and his efforts appear 
to be thrown away. Now and then a hasty 
touch will mar his image, and perhaps when 
he imagines his work is almost completed he 
will find what he imagined to be the beautiful 
form of Divine Love utterly destroyed, and 
he must begin again with his past bitter ex- 
perience to guide and help him. But he who 
has resolutely set himself to realize the Highest 



150 The Way of Peace 

recognizes no such thing as defeat. All failures 
are apparent, not real. Every slip, every fall, 
every return to selfishness is a lesson learned, 
an experience gained, from which a golden 
grain of wisdom is extracted, helping the 
striver toward the accomplishment of his lofty 
object. To recognize 

' ' That of our vices we can frame 
A ladder if we will but tread 
Beneath our feet each deed of shame, ' I 

is to enter the way that leads unmistakably 
towards the Divine, and the failings of one 
who thus recognizes are so many dead selves, 
upon which he rises, as upon stepping-stones, 
to higher things. 

Once come to regard your failings, your 
sorrows and sufferings as so many voices 
telling you plainly where you are weak and 
faulty, where you fall below the true and the 
divine, you will then begin to ceaselessly watch 
yourself, and every slip, every pang of pain 
will show you where you are to set to work, 
and what you have to remove out of your 
heart in order to bring it nearer to the likeness 
of the Divine, nearer to the Perfect Love. And 



The Realization of Selfless Love 151 

as you proceed, day by day detaching yourself 
more and more from the inward selfishness, 
the Love that is selfless will gradually become 
revealed to you. And when you are growing 
patient and calm, when your petulances, tem- 
pers, and irritabilities are passing away from 
you, and the more powerful lusts and pre- 
judices cease to dominate and enslave you, 
then you will know that the divine is awaken- 
ing within you, that you are drawing near to 
the eternal Heart, that you are not far from 
that selfless Love, the possession of which is 
peace and immortality. 

Divine Love is distinguished from human 
loves in this supremely important particular, 
it is free from partiality. Human loves cling 
to a particular object to the exclusion of all 
else, and when that object is removed, great 
and deep is the resultant suffering to the one 
who loves. Divine Love embraces the whole 
universe, and, without clinging to any part, 
yet contains within itself the whole, and he 
who comes to it by gradually purifying and 
broadening his human loves until all the selfish 
and impure elements are burnt out of them, 
ceases from suffering. It is because human 




152 The Way of Peace 

loves are narrow and confined and mingled 
with selfishness that they cause suffering. No 
suffering can result from that Love which is 
so absolutely pure that it seeks nothing for 
itself. Nevertheless, human loves are abso- 
lutely necessary as steps toward the Divine, 
and no soul is prepared to partake of Divine 
Love until it has become capable of the deep- 
est and most intense human love. It is only 
by passing through human loves and human 
sufferings that Divine Love is reached and 
realized. 

All human loves are perishable like the forms 
to which they cling; but there is a Love that 
is imperishable, and that does not cling to 
appearances. 

All human loves are counterbalanced by 
human hates; but there is a Love that admits 
of no opposite or reaction ; divine and free from 
all taint of self, that sheds its fragrance on all 
alike. 

Human loves are reflections of the Divine 
Love, and draw the soul nearer to the reality, 
the Love that knows neither sorrow nor change. 

It is well that the mother, clinging with pas- 
sionate tenderness to the little helpless form 



The Realization of Selfless Love 153 

of flesh that lies on her bosom, should be over- 
whelmed with the dark waters of sorrow when 
she sees it laid in the cold earth. It is well that 
her tears should flow and her heart ache, for 
only thus can she be reminded of the evanescent 
nature of the joys and objects of sense, and be 
drawn nearer to the eternal and imperishable 
Reality. 

It is well that lover, brother, sister, husband, 
wife should suffer deep anguish, and be en- 
veloped in gloom when the visible object of 
their affections is torn from them, so that they 
may learn to turn their affections toward the 
invisible Source of all, where alone abiding 
satisfaction is to be found. 

It is well that the proud, the ambitious, the 
self-seeking, should suffer defeat, humiliation, 
and misfortune; that they should pass through 
the scorching fires of affliction; for only thus 
can the wayward soul be brought to reflect 
upon the enigma ' of life ; only thus can the 
heart be softened and purified, and prepared to 
receive the Truth. 

When the sting of anguish penetrates the 
heart of human love ; when gloom and loneliness 
and desertion cloud the soul of friendship and 



154 The Way of Peace 

trust, then it is that the heart turns toward 
the sheltering love of the Eternal, and finds 
rest in its silent peace. And whosoever comes 
to this Love is not turned away comfortless, is 
not pierced with anguish nor surrounded with 
gloom; and is never deserted in the dark hour 
of trial. 

The glory of Divine Love can only be re- 
vealed in the heart that is chastened by sorrow, 
and the image of the heavenly state can only 
be perceived and realized when the lifeless, 
formless accretions of ignorance and self are 
hewn away. 

Only that Love that seeks no personal 
gratification or reward, that does not make 
distinctions, and that leaves behind no heart- 
aches, can be called divine. 

Men, clinging to self and to the comfortless 
shadows of evil, are in the habit of thinking 
of divine Love as something belonging to a 
God who is out of reach; as something outside 
themselves, and that must for ever remain 
outside. Truly, the Love of God is ever be- 
yond the reach of self, but when the heart 
and mind are emptied of self then the selfless 
Love, the supreme Love, the Love that is of 



The Realization of Selfless Love 155 

God or Good becomes an inward and abid- 
ing reality. 

And this inward realization of holy Love is 
none other than the Love of Christ that is so 
much talked about and so little comprehended. 
The Love that not only saves the soul from sin, 
but lifts it also above the power of temptation. 

But how may one attain to this sublime 
realization ? The answer which Truth has 
always given, and will ever give to this question 
is, — " Empty thyself, and I will fill thee." 
Divine Love cannot be known until self is dead, 
for self is the denial of Love, and how can that 
which is known be also denied? Not until the 
stone of self is rolled away from the sepulchre 
of the soul does the immortal Christ, the pure 
Spirit of Love, hitherto crucified, dead and 
buried, cast off the bands of ignorance, and come 
forth in all the majesty of His resurrection. 

You believe that the Christ of Nazareth was 
put to death and rose again. I do not say you 
err in that belief; but if you refuse to believe 
that the gentle spirit of Love is crucified daily 
upon the dark cross of your selfish desires, then, 
I say, you err in this unbelief and have not yet 
perceived, even afar off, the Love of Christ. 



156 The Way of Peace 

You say that you have tasted of salvation in 
the Love of Christ. Are you saved from your 
temper, your irritability, your vanity, your 
personal dislikes, your judgment and condem- 
nation of others? If not, from what are you 
saved, and wherein have you realized the 
transforming Love of Christ? 

He who has realized the Love that is divine 
has become a new man, and has ceased to be 
swayed and dominated by the old elements of 
self. He is known for his patience, his purity, 
his self-control, his deep charity of heart, and 
his unalterable sweetness. 

Divine or selfless Love is not a mere senti- 
ment or emotion; it is a state of knowledge 
which destroys the dominion of evil and the 
belief in evil, and lifts the soul into the joy- 
ful realization of the supreme Good. To the 
divinely wise, knowledge and Love are one and 
inseparable. 

It is toward the complete realization of this 
divine Love that the whole world is moving; 
it was for this purpose that the universe came 
into existence, and every grasping at happiness, 
every reaching out of the soul toward objects, 
ideas and ideals, is an effort to realize it. But 



The Realization op Selfless Love 157 

the world does not realize this Love at present 
because it is grasping at the fleeting shadow 
and ignoring, in its blindness, the substance. 
And so suffering and sorrow continue, and must 
continue until the world, taught by its self- 
inflicted pains, discovers the Love that is self- 
less, the wisdom that is calm and full of peace. 
And this Love, this Wisdom, this Peace, this 
tranquil state of mind and heart may be attained 
to, may be realized by all who are willing and 
ready to yield up self, and who are prepared 
to humbly enter into a comprehension of all 
that the giving up of self involves. There is 
no arbitrary power in the universe, and the 
strongest chains of fate by which men are 
bound are self -forged. Men are chained to that 
which causes suffering because they desire to be 
so, because they love their chains, because they 
think their little dark prison of self is sweet and 
beautiful, and they are afraid that if they desert 
that prison they will lose all that is real and 
worth having. 

* ' Ye suffer from yourselves, none else compels, 
None other holds ye that ye live and die." 

And the indwelling power which forged the 



158 The Way of Peace 

chains and built around itself the dark and 
narrow prison, can break away when it desires 
and wills to do so, and the soul does will to 
do so when it has discovered the worthlessness 
of its prison, when long suffering has prepared 
it for the reception of the boundless Light and 
Love. 

As the shadow follows the form, and as 
smoke comes after fire, so effect follows cause, 
and suffering and bliss follow the thoughts and 
deeds of men. There is no effect in the world 
around us but has its hidden or revealed cause, 
and that cause is in accordance with absolute 
justice. Men reap a harvest of suffering be- 
cause in the near or distant past they have 
sown the seeds of evil; they reap a harvest of 
bliss also as a result of their own sowing of 
the seeds of good. Let a man meditate upon 
this, let him strive to understand it, and he 
will then begin to sow only seeds of good, and 
will burn up the tares and weeds which he has 
formerly grown in the garden of his heart. 

The world does not understand the Love 
that is selfless because it is engrossed in the 
pursuit of its own pleasures, and cramped 
within the narrow limits of perishable interests, 



The Realization of Selfless Love 159 

mistaking, in its ignorance, those pleasures 
and interests for real and abiding things. 
Caught in the flames of fleshly lusts, and 
burning with anguish, it sees not the pure and 
peaceful beauty of Truth. Feeding upon the 
swinish husks of error and self-delusion, it is 
shut out from the mansion of all-seeing Love. 

Not having this Love, not understanding it, 
men institute innumerable reforms which involve 
no inward sacrifice, and each imagines that 
his reform is going to right the world for 
ever, whilst he himself continues to propagate 
evil by engaging in it in his own heart. That 
only can be called reform which tends to 
reform the human heart, for all evil has its 
rise there, and not until the world, ceasing 
from selfishness and party strife, has learned 
the lesson of divine Love, will it realize the 
Golden Age of universal blessedness. 

Let the rich cease to despise the poor, and 
the poor to condemn the rich; let the greedy 
learn how to give, and the lustful how to 
grow pure; let the partisan cease from strife, 
and the uncharitable begin to forgive; let 
the envious endeavor to rejoice with others, 
and the slanderers grow ashamed of their 



160 The Way of Peace 

conduct. Let men and women take this course, 
and, lo! the Golden Age is at hand. He, 
therefore, who purifies his own heart is the 
world's greatest benefactor. 

Yet, though the world is, and will be for 
many ages to come, shut out from that Age 
of Gold, which is the realization of selfless 
Love, you, if you are willing, may enter it 
now, by rising above your selfish self; if you 
will pass from prejudice, hatred, and condem- 
nation, to gentle and forgiving love. 

Where hatred, dislike, and condemnation are, 
selfless Love does not abide. It resides only 
in the heart that has ceased from all con- 
demnation. 

You say, " How can I love the drunkard, the 
hypocrite, the sneak, the murderer? I am 
compelled to dislike and condemn such ifien." 
It is true you cannot love such men emotion- 
ally, but when you say that you must perforce 
dislike and condemn them you show that you 
are not acquainted with the Great over-ruling 
Love ; for it is possible to attain to such a state 
of interior enlightenment as will enable you to 
perceive the train of causes by which these men 
have become as they are, to enter into their 



The Realization of Selfless Love 161 

intense sufferings, and to know the certainty 
of their ultimate purification. Possessed of 
such knowledge it will be utterly impossible 
for you any longer to dislike or condemn 
them, and you will always think of them with 
perfect calmness and deep compassion. 

If you love people and speak of them with 
praise until they in some way thwart you, or 
do something of which you disapprove, and 
then you dislike them and speak of them with 
dispraise, you are not governed by the Love 
which is of God. If, in your heart, you are 
continually arraigning and condemning others, 
selfless Love is hidden from you. 

He who knows that Love is at the heart 
of all things, and has realized the all-sufficing 
power of that Love, has no room in his heart 
for condemnation. 

Men, not knowing this Love, constitute them- 
selves judge and executioner of their fellows, 
forgetting that there is the Eternal Judge and 
Executioner, and in so far as men deviate from 
them in their own views, their particular 
reforms and methods, they brand them as 
fanatical, unbalanced, lacking judgment, sin- 
cerity, and honesty; in so far as others 



162 The Way of Peace 

approximate to their own standard do they 
look upon them as being everything that is 
admirable. Such are the men who are cen- 
tered in self. But he whose heart is centered 
in the supreme Love does not so brand and 
classify men; does not seek to convert men 
to his own views, not to convince them of the 
superiority of his methods. Knowing the Law 
of Love, he lives it, and maintains the same 
calm attitude of mind and sweetness of heart 
towards all. The debased and the virtuous, 
the foolish and the wise, the learned and the 
unlearned, the selfish and the unselfish receive 
alike the benediction of his tranquil thought. 

You can only attain to this supreme knowl- 
edge, this divine Love by unremitting en- 
deavor in self -discipline, and by gaining 
victory after victory over yourself. Only the 
pure in heart see God, and when your heart 
is sufficiently purified you will enter into the 
New Birth, and the Love that does not die, 
nor change, nor end in pain and sorrow will 
be awakened within you, and you will be at 
peace. 

He who strives for the attainment of divine 
Love is ever seeking to overcome the spirit of 



The Realization of Selfless Love 163 

condemnation, for where there is pure spiritual 
knowledge, condemnation cannot exist, and 
only in the heart that has become incapable 
of condemnation is Love perfected and fully 
realized. 

The Christian condemns the Atheist; the 
Atheist satirizes the Christian; the Catholic 
and Protestant are ceaselessly engaged in 
wordy warfare, and the spirit of strife and 
hatred rules where peace and love should be. 

" He that hateth his brother is a murderer," 
a crucifier of the divine Spirit of Love; and 
until you can regard men of all religions and 
of no religion with the same impartial spirit, 
with all freedom from dislike, and with per- 
fect equanimity, you have yet to strive for 
that Love which bestows upon its possessor 
freedom and salvation. 

The realization of divine knowledge, selfless 
Love, utterly destroys the spirit of condemna- 
tion, disperses all evil, and lifts the conscious- 
ness to that height of pure vision where Love, 
Goodness, Justice are seen to be universal, 
supreme, all-conquering, indestructible. 

Train your mind in strong, impartial, and 
gentle thought; train your heart in purity and 



164 The Way of Peace 

compassion; train your tongue to silence and 
to true and stainless speech; so shall you enter 
the way of holiness and peace, and shall 
ultimately realize the immortal Love. So 
living, without seeking to convert, you will 
convince; without arguing, you will teach; 
not cherishing ambition, the wise will find 
you out; and without striving to gain men's 
opinions, you will subdue their hearts. For 
Love is all-conquering, all-powerful; and the 
thoughts, and deeds, and words of Love can 
never perish. 

To know that Love is universal, supreme, all- 
sufficing; to be freed from the trammels of 
evil; to be quit of the inward unrest; to 
know that all men are striving to realize the 
Truth each in his own way; to be satisfied, 
sorrowless, serene; this is peace; this is glad- 
ness; this is immortality; this is Divinity; this 
is the realization of selfless Love. 



The Realization of Selfless Love 165 



I stood upon the shore, and saw the rocks 
Resist the onslaught of the mighty sea, 

And when I thought how all the countless shocks 
They had withstood through an eternity, 

I said, ' ' To wear away this solid main 

The ceaseless efforts of the waves are vain." 

But when I thought how they the rocks had rent, 
And saw the sand and shingles at my feet 

( Poor passive remnants of resistance spent ) 

Tumbled and tossed where they the waters meet, 

Then saw I ancient landmarks 'neath the waves, 

And knew the waters held the stones their slaves. 

I saw the mighty work the waters wrought 
By patient softness and unceasing flow ; 

How they the proudest promontory brought 
Unto their feet, and mossy hills laid low ; 

How the soft drops the adamantine wall 

Conquered at last, and brought it to its fall. 

And then I knew that hard, resisting sin 

Should yield at last to Love's soft ceaseless roll 

Coming and going, ever flowing in 

Upon the proud rocks of the human soul ; 

That all resistance should be spent and past, 

And every heart yield unto it at last. 



ENTERING INTO THE INFINITE 

From the beginning of time, man, in spite 
of his bodily appetites and desires, in the 
midst of all his clinging to earthly and im- 
permanent things, has ever been intuitively 
conscious of the limited, transient, and illu- 
sionary nature of his material existence, and 
in his sane and silent moments has tried to 
reach out into a comprehension of the Infinite, 
and has turned with tearful aspiration towards 
the restful Reality of the Eternal Heart. 

Whilst vainly imagining that the pleasures 
of earth are real and satisfying, pain and 
sorrow continually remind him of their un- 
real and unsatisfying nature. Ever striving 
to believe that complete satisfaction is to be 
found in material things, he is conscious of 
an inward and persistent revolt against this 
belief, which revolt is at once a refutation of 
his essential mortality, and an inherent and 
imperishable proof that only in the immortal, 

166 



Entering into the Infinite 167 

the eternal, the infinite can he find abiding 
satisfaction and unbroken peace. 

And here is the common ground of faith; 
here the root and spring of all religion; here 
the soul of Brotherhood and the heart of Love, 
— that man is essentially and spiritually divine 
and eternal, and that, immersed in mortality 
and troubled with unrest, he is ever striving 
to enter into a consciousness of his real 
nature. 

The spirit of man is inseparable from the 
Infinite, and can be satisfied with nothing 
short of the Infinite, and the burden of pain 
will continue to weigh upon man's heart, and 
the shadows of sorrow to darken his pathway 
until, ceasing from his wanderings in the 
dream-world of matter, he comes back to his 
home in the reality of the Eternal. 

As the smallest drop of water detached from 
the ocean contains all the qualities of the 
ocean, so man, detached in consciousness from 
the Infinite, contains within him its likeness; 
and as the drop of water must, by the law of 
its nature, ultimately find its way back to the 
ocean and lose itself in its silent depths, so 
must man, by the unfailing law of his nature, 



168 The Way of Peace 

at last return to his source, and lose himself 
in the great ocean of the Infinite. 

To re-become one with the Infinite is the 
goal of man. To enter into perfect harmony 
with the Eternal Law is Wisdom, Love and 
Peace. But this divine state is, and must ever 
be, incomprehensible to the merely personal. 
Personality, separateness, selfishness are one 
and the same, and are the antithesis of 
wisdom and divinity. By the unqualified 
surrender of the personality, separateness and 
selfishness cease, and man enters into the 
possession of his divine heritage of immortality 
and infinity. 

Such surrender of the personality is re 
garded by the worldly and selfish mind as 
the most grievous of all calamities, the most 
irreparable loss, yet it is the one supreme and 
incomparable blessing, the only real and last- 
ing gain. The mind unenlightened upon the 
inner laws of being, and upon the nature and 
destiny of its own life, clings to transient 
appearances, things which have in them no en- 
during substantiality, and so clinging, perishes, 
for the time being, amid the shattered wreck- 
age of its own illusions, 



Entering into the Infinite 169 

Men cling to and gratify the flesh as though 
it were going to last forever, and though 
they try to forget the nearness and inevita- 
bility of its dissolution, the dread of death 
and of the loss of all that they cling to 
clouds their happiest hours, and the chilling 
shadow of their own selfishness follows them 
like a remorseless spectre. 

And with the accumulation of temporal 
comforts and luxuries, the divinity within 
men is drugged, and they sink deeper and 
deeper into materiality, into the perishable 
life of the senses, and where there is sufficient 
intellect, theories concerning the immortality 
of the flesh come to be regarded as infallible 
truths. When a man's soul is clouded with 
selfishness in any or every form, he loses the 
power of spiritual discrimination, and confuses 
the temporal with the eternal, the perishable 
with the permanent, mortality with immortality, 
and error with Truth. It is thus that the 
world has come to be filled with theories and 
speculations having no foundation in human 
experience. Every body of flesh contains 
within itself, from the hour of birth, the 
elements of its own destruction, and by the 



170 The Way of Peace 

unalterable law of its own nature must it 
pass away. 

The perishable in the universe can never 
become permanent; the permanent can never 
pass away; the mortal can never become im- 
mortal, the immortal can never die ; the 
temporal cannot become eternal nor the 
eternal become temporal ; appearance can 
never become reality, nor reality fade into 
appearance ; error can never become Truth, 
nor can Truth become error. Man cannot 
immortalize the flesh, but, by overcoming the 
flesh, by relinquishing all its inclinations, he 
can enter the region of immortality. "God 
alone hath immortality,' ' and only by realizing 
the God state of consciousness does man enter 
into immortality. 

All nature in its myriad forms of life is 
changeable, impermanent, unenduring. Only 
the informing Principle of nature endures. 
Nature is many, and is marked by separation. 
The informing Principle is One, and is marked 
by unity. By overcoming the senses and the 
selfishness within, which is the overcoming of 
nature, man emerges from the chrysalis of 
the personal and illusionary, and wings him- 



Entering into the Infinite 171 

self into the glorious light of the impersonal, 
the region of universal Truth, out of which 
all perishable forms come. 

Let men, therefore, practise self-denial ; let 
them conquer their animal inclinations ; let 
them refuse to be enslaved by luxury and 
pleasure ; let them practise virtue, and grow 
daily into higher and ever higher virtue, until 
at last they grow into the Divine, and enter 
into both the practice and the comprehension 
of humility, meekness, forgiveness, compassion, 
and love, which practice and comprehension 
constitute Divinity. 

"Goodwill gives insight," and only he who 
has so conquered his personality that he has 
but one attitude of mind, that of goodwill 
toward all creatures, is possessed of divine 
insight, and is capable of distinguishing the 
true from the false. The supremely good 
man, is therefore, the wise man, the divine 
man, the enlightened seer, the knower of the 
Eternal. Where you find unbroken gentle- 
ness, enduring patience, sublime lowliness, 
graciousness of speech, self-control, self -for- 
ge tfulness, and deep and abounding sympathy, 
look there for the highest wisdom, seek the 



172 The Way of Peace 

company of such a one, for he has realized 
the Divine, he lives with the Eternal, he has 
become one with the Infinite. Believe not 
him that is impatient, given to anger, boast- 
ful, who clings to pleasure and refuses to 
renounce his selfish gratifications, and who 
practises not goodwill and far-reaching com- 
passion, for such a one hath not wisdom, vain 
is all his knowledge, and his works and words 
will perish, for they are grounded on that 
which passes away. 

Let a man abandon self, let him overcome 
the world, let him deny the personal ; by this 
pathway only can he enter into the heart of 
the Infinite. 

The world, the body, the personality are 
mirages upon the desert of time ; transitory 
dreams in the dark night of spiritual slumber, 
and those who have crossed the desert, those 
who are spiritually awakened, have alone 
comprehended the Universal Reality where 
all appearances are dispersed and dreaming 
and delusion are destroyed. 

There is one Great Law which exacts un- 
conditional obedience, one unifying principle 
which is the basis of all diversity, one eternal 



Entering into the Infinite 173 

Truth wherein all the problems of earth pass 
away like shadows. To realize this Law, this 
Unity, this Truth, is to enter into the Infinite, 
is to become one with the Eternal. 

To center one's life in the Great Law of 
Love is to enter into rest, harmony, peace, 
To refrain from all participation in evil and 
discord ; to cease from all resistance to evil, 
and from the omission of that which is good, 
and to fall back upon unswerving obedience 
to the holy calm within, is to enter into the 
inmost heart of things, is to attain to a living, 
conscious experience of that eternal and infinite 
principle which must ever remain a hidden 
mystery to the merely perceptive intellect. 
Until this principle is realized, the soul is not 
established in peace, and he who so realises is 
truly wise; not wise with the wisdom of the 
learned, but with the simplicity of a blameless 
heart and of a divine manhood. 

To enter into a realization of the Infinite 
and Eternal is to rise superior to time, and 
the world, and the body, which comprise the 
kingdom of darkness ; and is to become es- 
tablished in immortality, Heaven, and the 
Spirit, which make up the Empire of Light. 



174 The Way of Peace 

Entering into the Infinite is not a mere 
theory or sentiment. It is a vital experience 
which is the result of assiduous practice in 
inward purification. When the body is no 
longer believed to be, even remotely, the 
real man ; when all appetites and desires are 
thoroughly subdued and purified ; when the 
emotions are rested and calm, and when the 
oscillation of the intellect ceases and perfect 
poise is secured, then, and not till then, does 
consciousness become one with the Infinite; 
not until then is childlike wisdom and profound 
peace secured. 

Men grow weary and grey over the dark 
problems of life, and finally pass away and 
leave them unsolved because they cannot see 
their way out of the darkness of the person- 
ality, being too much engrossed in its limita- 
tions. Seeking to save his personal life, man 
forfeits the greater impersonal Life in Truth; 
clinging to the perishable, he is shut out from 
a knowledge of the Eternal. 

By the surrender of self all difficulties are 
overcome, and there is no error in the uni- 
verse but the fire of inward sacrifice will burn 
it up like chaff ; no problem, however great, 



Entering into the Infinite 175 

but will disappear like a shadow under the 
searching light of self-abnegation. Problems 
exist only in our own self -created illusions, 
and they vanish away when self is yielded 
up. Self and error are synonymous. Error 
is involved in the darkness of unfathomable 
complexity, but eternal simplicity is the glory 
of Truth. 

Love of self shuts men out from Truth, and 
seeking their own personal happiness they lose 
the deeper, purer, and more abiding bliss. 
Says Carlyle — " There is in man a higher than 
love of happiness. He can do without happi- 
ness, and instead thereof find blessedness. 

. . . Love not pleasure, love God. This 
is the Everlasting Yea, wherein all contradic- 
tion is solved; wherein whoso walks and works, 
it is well with him." 

He who has yielded up that self, that per- 
sonality that men most love, and to which 
they cling with such fierce tenacity, has left 
behind him all perplexity, and has entered into 
a simplicity so profoundly simple as to be 
looked upon by the world, involved as it is in 
a network of error, as foolishness. Yet such 
a one has realized the highest wisdom, and is 



176 The Way of Peace 

at rest in the Infinite. He " accomplishes 
without striving/' and all problems melt before 
him, for he has entered the region of reality, 
and deals not with changing effects, but with 
the unchanging principles of things. He is 
enlightened with a wisdom which is as superior 
to ratiocination, as reason is to animality. 
Having yielded up his lusts, his errors, his 
opinions and prejudices, he has entered into 
possession of the knowledge of God, having 
slain the selfish desire for heaven, and along 
with it the ignorant fear of hell ; having re- 
linquished even the love of life itself, he has 
gained supreme bliss and Life Eternal, the 
Life which bridges life and death, and knows 
its own immortality. Having yielded up all 
without reservation, he has gained all, and 
rests in peace on the bosom of the Infinite. 

Only he who has become so free from self 
as to be equally content to be annihilated as 
to live, or to live as to be annihilated, is fit to 
enter into the Infinite. Only he who, ceasing 
to trust his perishable self, has learned to trust 
in boundless measure the Great Law, the 
Supreme Good, is prepared to partake of un- 
dying bliss. 



Entering into the Infinite 177 

For such a one there is no more regret, 
nor disappointment, nor remorse, for where all 
selfishness has ceased these sufferings cannot 
be ; and whatever happens to him he knows 
that it is for his own good, and he is content, 
being no longer the servant of self, but the 
servant of the Supreme. He is no longer 
affected by the changes of earth, and when he 
hears of wars and rumors of wars his peace 
is not disturbed, and where men grow angry 
and cynical and quarrelsome, he bestows com- 
passion and love. Though appearances may 
contradict it, he knows that the world is pro- 
gressing, and that 

4 * Through its laughing and its weeping, 
Through its living and its keeping, 
Through its follies and its labors, weaving in 
and out of sight, 
To the end from the beginning, 
Through all virtue and all sinning, 
Reeled from God *s great spool of Progress, runs 
the golden thread of light. ' ' 

When a fierce storm is raging none are 
angered about it, because they know it will 
quickly pass away, and when the storms of 
contention are devastating the world, the wise 
man, looking with the eye of Truth and pity, 



178 The Way of Peace 

knows that it will pass away, and that out of 
the wreckage of broken hearts which it leaves 
behind the immortal Temple of Wisdom will 
be built. 

Sublimely patient ; infinitely compassionate ; 
deep, silent, and pure, his very presence is a 
benediction; and when he speaks men ponder 
his words in their hearts, and by them rise 
to higher levels of attainment. Such is he 
who has entered into the Infinite, who by 
the power of utmost sacrifice has solved the 
sacred mystery of life. 






Entering into the Infinite 179 



Questioning Life and Destiny and Truth, 
I sought the dark and labyrinthine Sphinx, 
Who spake to me this strange and wondrous thing:- 
"Concealment only lies in blinded eyes, 
And God alone can see the Form of God. ! 1 

I sought to solve this hidden mystery 
Vainly by paths of blindness and of pain, 
But when I found the Way of Love and Peace, 
Concealment ceased, and I was blind no more : 
Then saw I God e 'en with the eyes of God. 



SAINTS, SAGES AND SAVIORS : 
THE LAW OP SERVICE 

The spirit of Love which is manifested as a 
perfect and rounded life, is the crown of being 
and the supreme end of knowledge upon this 
earth. 

The measure of a man's truth is the measure 
of his love, and Truth is far removed from 
him whose life is not governed by Love. The 
intolerant and condemnatory, even though they 
profess the highest religion, have the smallest 
measure of Truth; while those who exercise 
patience, and who listen calmly and dispassion- 
ately to all sides, and both arrive themselves 
at, and incline others to, thoughtful and un- 
biassed conclusions upon all problems and 
issues, have Truth in fullest measure. The 
final test of wisdom is this, — how does a man 
live ? What spirit does he manifest ? How 
does he act under trial and temptation ? Many 
men boast of being in possession of Truth who 
are continually swayed by grief, disappointment, 

180 



Saints, Sages and Saviors 181 

and passion, and who sink under the first little 
trial that comes along. Truth is nothing if not 
unchangeable, and in so far as a man takes his 
stand upon Truth does he become steadfast in 
virtue, does he rise superior to his passions and 
emotions and changeable personality. 

Men formulate perishable dogmas, and call 
them Truth. Truth cannot be formulated ; it 
is ineffable, and ever beyond the reach of in- 
tellect. It can only be experienced by prac- 
tice ; it can only be manifested as a stainless 
heart and a perfect life. 

Who, then, in the midst of the ceaseless 
pandemonium of schools and creeds and 
parties, has the truth ? He who lives it. He 
who practises it. He who, having risen above 
that pandemonium by overcoming himself, no 
longer engages in it, but sits apart, quiet, sub- 
dued, calm, and self-possessed, freed from all 
strife, all bias, all condemnation, and bestows 
upon all the glad and unselfish love of the 
divinity within him. 

He who is patient, calm, gentle, and forgiv- 
ing under all circumstances, manifests the 
Truth. Truth will never be proved by wordy 
arguments and learned treatises, for if men do 



182 The Way of Peace 

not perceive the Truth in infinite patience, 
undying forgiveness, and all-embracing com- 
passion, no words can ever prove it to them. 

It is an easy matter for the passionate to 
be calm and patient when they are alone, or 
are in the midst of calmness. It is equally 
easy for the uncharitable to be gentle and 
kind when they are dealt kindly with, but he 
who retains his patience and calmness under 
all trial, who remains sublimely meek and 
gentle under the most trying circumstances, 
he, and he alone, is possessed of the spotless 
Truth. And this is so because such lofty 
virtues belong to the Divine, and can only be 
manifested by one who has attained to the 
highest wisdom, who has relinquished his 
passionate and self-seeking nature, who has 
realized the supreme and unchangeable Law, 
and has brought himself into harmony with it. 

Let men, therefore, cease from vain and 
passionate arguments about Truth, and let 
them think and say and do those things which 
make for harmony, peace, love, and goodwill. 
Let them practise heart-virtu€, and search 
humbly and diligently for the Truth which 
frees the soul from all error and sin, from 



Saints, Sages and Saviors 183 

all that blights the human heart, and that 
darkens, as with unending night, the pathway 
of the wandering souls of earth. 

There is one great all-embracing Law which 
is the foundation and cause of the universe, 
the Law of Love. It has been called by many 
names in various countries and at various times, 
but behind all its names the same unalterable 
Law may be discovered by the eye of Truth. 
Names, religions, personalities pass away, but 
the Law of Love remains. To become pos- 
sessed of a knowledge of this Law, to enter 
into conscious harmony with it, is to become 
immortal, invincible, indestructible. 

It is because of the effort of the soul to 
realize this Law that men come again and 
again to live, to suffer, and to die ; and when 
realised, suffering ceases, personality is dis- 
persed, and the fleshly life and death are 
destroyed, for consciousness becomes one with 
the Eternal. 

The Law is absolutely impersonal, and its 
highest manifested expression is that of Service. 
When the purified heart has realized Truth it 
is then called upon to make the last, the 
greatest and holiest sacrifice, the sacrifice of 



184 The Way of Peace 

the well-earned enjoyment of Truth. It is 
by virtue of this sacrifice that the divinely- 
emancipated soul comes to dwell amongst 
men, clothed with a body of flesh, content to 
dwell amongst the lowliest and least, and to 
be esteemed the servant of all mankind. That 
sublime humility which is manifested by the 
world's savior's is the seal of Godhead, and 
he who has annihilated the personality, and 
has become a living, visible manifestation of 
the impersonal, eternal, boundless Spirit of 
Love, is alone singled out as worthy to re- 
ceive the unstinted worship of posterity. He 
only who succeeds in humbling himself with 
that divine humility which is not only the 
extinction of self, but is also the pouring out 
upon all the spirit of unselfish love, is exalted 
above measure, and given spiritual dominion 
in the hearts of mankind. 

All the great spiritual teachers have denied 
themselves personal luxuries, comforts, and 
rewards, have abjured temporal power, and 
have lived and taught the limitless and im- 
personal Truth. Compare their lives and 
teachings, and you will find the same sim- 
plicity, the same self - sacrifice, the same 



Saints, Sages and Saviors 185 

humility, love, and peace both lived and 
preached by them. They taught the same 
eternal Principles, the realization of which de- 
stroys all evil. Those who have been hailed 
and worshipped as the saviors of mankind 
are manifestations of the Great impersonal 
Law, and being such, were free from passion 
and prejudice, and having no opinions, and 
no special letter of doctrine to preach and 
defend, they never sought to convert and to 
proselytize. Living in the highest Goodness, 
the supreme Perfection, their sole object was 
to uplift mankind by manifesting that Good- 
ness in thought, word, and deed. They stand 
between man the personal and God the im- 
personal, and serve as exemplary types for 
the salvation of self -enslaved mankind. 

Men who are immersed in self, and who 
cannot comprehend the Goodness that is abso- 
lutely impersonal, deny divinity to all saviors 
except their own, and thus introduce personal 
hatred and doctrinal controversy, and, whilst 
defending their own particular views with pas- 
sion, look upon each other as being heathens 
or infidels, and so render null and void, as 
far as their lives are concerned, the unselfish 



186 The Way of Peace 

beauty and holy grandeur of the lives and 
teachings of their own Masters. Truth can- 
not be limited ; it can never be the special 
prerogative of any man, school, or nation, and 
when personality steps in, Truth is lost. 

The glory alike of the saint, the sage, and 
the savior is this, — that he has realized the 
most profound lowliness, the most sublime 
unselfishness; having given up all, even his 
own personality, all his works are holy and 
enduring, for they are freed from every taint 
of self. He gives, yet never thinks of receiv- 
ing ; he works without regretting the past or 
anticipating the future, and never looks for 
reward. 

When the farmer has tilled and dressed his 
land and put in the seed, he knows that he 
has done all that he can possibly do, and that 
now he must trust to the elements, and wait 
patiently for the course of time to bring about 
the harvest, and that no amount of expectancy 
on his part will affect the result. Even so, 
he who has realized Truth goes forth as a 
sower of the seeds of goodness, purity, love 
and peace, without expectancy, and never look- 
ing for results, knowing that there is the Great 



Saints, Sages and Saviors 187 

Over-ruling Law which brings about its own 
harvest in due time, and which is alike the 
source of preservation and destruction. 

Men, not understanding the divine simplicity 
of a profound unselfish heart, look upon their 
particular savior as the manifestation of a 
special miracle, as being something entirely 
apart and distinct from the nature of things, 
and as being, in his ethical excellence, eter- 
nally unapproachable by the whole of mankind. 
This attitude of unbelief (for such it is) in 
the divine perfectibility of man, paralyzes effort, 
and binds the souls of men as with strong 
ropes to sin and suffering. Jesus "grew in 
wisdom 1 ' and was " perfected by suffering." 
What Jesus was, he became such ; what 
Buddha was, he became such; and every holy 
man became such by unremitting perseverance 
in self-sacrifice. Once recognize this, once 
realize that by watchful effort and hopeful 
perseverance you can rise above your lower 
nature, and great and glorious will be the 
vistas of attainment that will open out before 
you. Buddha vowed that he would not relax 
his efforts until he arrived at the state of 
perfection, and he accomplished his purpose. 



188 The Way of Peace 

What the saints, sages, and saviors have 
accomplished, you likewise may accomplish if 
you will only tread the way which they trod 
and pointed out, the way of self-sacrifice, of 
self-denying service. 

Truth is very simple. It says, "Give up 
self," "Come unto Me" (away from all that 
defiles) "and I will give you rest." All the 
mountains of commentary that have been piled 
upon it cannot hide it from the heart that is 
earnestly seeking for righteousness. It does 
not require learning; it can be known in spite 
of learning. Disguised under many forms by 
erring, self-seeking man, the beautiful simplicity 
and clear transparency of Truth remains un- 
altered and undimmed, and the unselfish heart 
enters into and partakes of its shining radiance. 
Not by weaving complex theories, not by 
building up speculative philosophies is Truth 
realized ; but by weaving the web of inward 
purity, by building up the Temple of a stain- 
less life is Truth realized. 

He who enters upon this holy way begins 
by restraining his passions. This is virtue, 
and is the beginning of saintship, and saint- 
ship is the beginning of holiness. The entirely 



Saints, Sages and Saviors 189 

worldly man gratifies all his desires, and prac- 
tises no more restraint than the law of the 
land in which he lives demands ; the vir- 
tuous man restrains his passions; the saint 
attacks the enemy of Truth in its stronghold 
within his own heart, and restrains all selfish 
and impure thoughts; whilst the holy man is 
he who is free from passion and all impure 
thought, and to whom goodness and purity 
have become as natural as scent and color 
are to the flower. The holy man is divinely 
wise ; he alone knows Truth in its fullness, 
and has entered into abiding rest and peace. 
For him evil has ceased ; it has disappeared 
in the universal light of the All-Good. Holi- 
ness is the badge of wisdom. Said Krishna 
to the Prince Arjuna — 

" Humbleness, truthfulness, and harmlessness, 
Patience and honor, reverence for the wise, 
Purity, constancy, control of self, 
Contempt of sense-delights, self-sacrifice, 
Perception of the certitude of ill 
In birth, death, age, disease, suffering and sin ; 
An ever tranquil heart in fortunes good 

And fortunes evil ... 

Endeavors resolute 

To reach perception of the utmost soul, 



190 The Way of Peace 

And grace to understand what gain it were 
So to attain — this is true wisdom, Prince ! 
And what is otherwise is ignorance ! ' ' 

Whoever fights ceaselessly against his own 
selfishness, and strives to supplant it with all- 
embracing love is a saint, whether he live 
in a cottage or in the midst of riches and 
influence ; or whether he preaches or remains 
obscure. 

To the worldling, who is beginning to aspire 
towards higher things, the saint, such as a 
sweet St. Francis of Assisi, or a conquering 
St. Anthony, is a glorious and inspiring spec- 
tacle ; to the saint, an equally enrapturing 
sight is that of the sage, sitting serene and 
holy, the conqueror of sin and sorrow, no 
more tormented by regret and remorse, and 
whom even temptation can never reach ; and 
yet even the sage is drawn on by a still more 
glorious vision, that of the savior actively 
manifesting his knowledge in selfless works, 
and rendering his divinity more potent for 
good by sinking himself in the throbbing, sor- 
rowing, aspiring heart of mankind. 

And this only is true service — to forget 
oneself in love towards all, to lose oneself 



Saints, Sages and Saviors 191 

in working for the whole. O thou vain and 
foolish man, who thinkest that thy many works 
can save thee; who, chained to all error, talkest 
loudly of thyself, thy work, and thy many 
sacrifices, and magnifiest thine own impor- 
tance ; know this, that though thy fame fill 
the whole earth, all thy work shall come to 
dust, and thou thyself be reckoned lower than 
the least in the Kingdom of Truth ! 

Only the work that is impersonal can live; 
the works of self are both powerless and 
perishable. Where duties, howsoever humble, 
are done without self-interest, and with joyful 
sacrifice, there is true service and enduring 
work. Where deeds, however brilliant and 
apparently successful, are done from love of 
self, there is ignorance of the Law of Service, 
and the work perishes. 

It is given to the world to learn one great 
and divine lesson, the lesson of absolute un- 
selfishness. The saints, sages, and saviors of 
all time are they who have submitted them- 
selves to this task, and have learned and 
lived it. All the Scriptures of the world are 
framed to teach this one lesson; all the great 
teachers reiterate it. It is too simple for the 



192 The Way of Peace 

world which, scorning it, stumbles along in 
the complex ways of selfishness. 

A pure heart is the end of all religion and 
the beginning of divinity. To search for this 
Righteousness is to walk the Way of Truth 
and Peace, and he who enters this Way will 
soon perceive that Immortality which is in- 
dependent of birth and death, and will realize 
that in the Divine economy of the universe 
the humblest effort is not lost. 

The divinity of a Krishna, a Gautama, or a 
Jesus is the crowning glory of self-abnegation, 
the end of the soul's pilgrimage in matter 
and mortality, and the world will not have 
finished its long journey until every soul has 
become as these, and has entered into the 
blissful realization of its own divinity. 



Saints, Sages and Saviors 193 



Great glory crowns the heights of hope by arduous 

struggle won ; 
Bright honor rounds the hoary head that mighty works 

hath done ; 
Fair riches come to him who strives in ways of golden 

gain, 
And fame enshrines his name who works with genius- 
glowing brain : 
But greater glory waits for him who, in the bloodless 

strife 
'Gainst self and wrong, adopts, in love, the sacrificial 

life ; 
And brighter honor rounds the brow of him who, 'mid 

the scorns 
Of blind idolaters of self, accepts the crown of thorns ; 
And fairer, purer riches come to him who greatly 

strives 
To walk in ways of love and truth to sweeten human 

lives ; 
And he who serveth well mankind exchanges fleeting 

fame 
For Light eternal, Joy and Peace, and robes of heavenly 

flame. 



THE REALIZATION OF PERFECT 
PEACE 

In the external universe there is ceaseless 
turmoil, change, and unrest ; at the heart of 
all things there is undisturbed repose; in this 
deep silence dwelleth the Eternal. 

Man partakes of this duality, and both the 
surface change and disquietude, and the deep- 
seated eternal abode of Peace are contained 
within him. 

As there are silent depths in the ocean which 
the fiercest storm cannot reach, so there are 
silent, holy depths in the heart of man which 
the storms of sin and sorrow can never disturb. 

To reach this silence and to live consciously 
in it is peace. 

Discord is rife in the outward world, but un- 
broken harmony holds sway at the heart of the 
universe. The human soul, torn by discordant 
passion and grief, reaches blindly toward the 
harmony of the sinless state, and to reach this 
state and to live consciously in it is peace. 

194 



The Realization of Perfect Peace 195 

Hatred severs human lives, fosters persecu- 
tion, and hurls nations into ruthless war, yet 
men, though they do not understand why, 
retain some measure of faith in the over- 
shadowing of a Perfect Love ; and to reach 
this love and to live consciously in it is 
peace. 

And this inward peace, this silence, this har- 
mony, this Love, is the Kingdom of Heaven, 
which is so difficult to reach because few are 
willing to give up themselves and to become 
as little children. 

"Heaven's gate is very narrow and minute, 
It cannot be perceived by foolish men 
Blinded by vain illusions of the world ; 
E 'en the clear-sighted who discern the way, 
And seek to enter, find the portal barred, 
And hard to be unlocked. Its massive bolts 
Are pride and passion, avarice and lust." 

Men cry peace ! peace ! where there is no 
peace, but on the contrary, discord, disquietude 
and strife. Apart from that Wisdom which is 
inseparable from self-renunciation, there can 
be no real and abiding peace. 

The peace which results from social com- 
fort, passing gratification, or worldly victory is 



196 The Way of Peace 

transitory in its nature, and is burnt up in 
the heat of fiery trial. Only the Peace of 
Heaven endures through all trial, and only 
the selfless heart can know the Peace of 
Heaven. 

Holiness alone is undying peace. Self-con- 
trol leads to it, and the ever-increasing Light 
of Wisdom guides the pilgrim on his way. It 
is partaken of in a measure as soon as the 
path of virtue is entered upon, but it is only 
realized in its fullness when self disappears in 
the consummation of a stainless life. 

* ' This is peace, 
To conquer love of self and lust of life, 
To tear deep-rooted passion from the heart 
To still the inward strife. ' ' 

If, O reader ! you would realize the Light 
that never fades, the joy that never ends, and 
the tranquility that cannot be disturbed ; if 
you would leave behind for ever your sins, 
your sorrows, your anxieties and perplexities; 
if, I say, you would partake of this salvation, 
this supremely glorious Life, then conquer 
yourself. Bring every thought, every impulse, 
every desire into perfect obedience to the 



The Realization of Perfect Peace 197 

divine power resident within you. There is no 
other way to peace but this, and if you refuse 
to walk it, your much praying and your strict 
adherence to ritual will be fruitless and un- 
availing, and neither gods nor angels can help 
you. Only to him that overcometh is given 
the white stone of the regenerate life, on which 
is written the New and Ineffable Name. 

Come away, for a while, from external 
things, from the pleasures of the senses, from 
the arguments of the intellect, from the noise 
and the excitements of the world, and with- 
draw yourself into the inmost chamber of your 
heart, and there, free from the sacrilegious 
intrusion of all selfish desires, you will find 
a deep silence, a holy calm, a blissful repose, 
and if you will rest awhile in that holy place, 
and will mediate there, the faultless eye of 
Truth will open within you, and you will see 
things as they really are. This holy place 
within you is your real and eternal self ; it is 
the divine within you ; and only when you 
identify yourself with it can you be said to be 
"clothed and in your right mind." It is the 
abode of peace, the temple of wisdom, the 
dwelling-place of immortality. Apart from 



198 The Way of Peace 

this inward resting-place, this Mount of Vision, 
there can be no true peace, no knowledge of 
the Divine, and if you can remain there for 
one minute, one hour, or one day, it is possible 
for you to remain there always. 

All your sins and sorrows, your fears and 
anxieties are your own, and you can cling to 
them or you can give them up. Of your own 
accord you cling to your unrest ; of your own 
accord you can come to abiding peace. No 
one else can give up sin for you ; you must 
give it up yourself. The greatest teacher can 
do no more than walk the way of Truth for 
himself, and point it out to you ; you yourself 
must walk it for yourself. You can obtain 
freedom and peace alone by your own efforts, 
by yielding up that which binds the soul, and 
which is destructive of peace. 

The angels of divine peace and joy are 
always at hand, and if you do not see them, 
and hear them, and dwell with them, it is 
because you shut yourself out from them, and 
prefer the company of the spirits of evil within 
you. You are what you will to be, what you 
wish to be, what you prefer to be. You can 
commence to purify yourself, and by so doing 



.The Realization of Perfect Peace 199 

can arrive at peace, or you can refuse to purify 
yourself, and so remain with suffering. 

Step aside, then ; come out of the fret and 
the fever of life ; away from the scorching heat 
of self, and enter the inward resting-place 
where the cooling airs of peace will calm, 
renew, and restore you. 

Come out of the storms of sin and anguish. 
Why be troubled and tempest-tossed when the 
haven of peace is so near ? 

Give up all self-seeking ; give up self, and 
lo ! the Peace of God is yours ! 

Subdue the animal within you ; conquer every 
selfish uprising, every discordant voice ; trans- 
mute the base metals of your selfish nature 
into the unalloyed gold of Love, and you shall 
realize the Life of Perfect Peace. Thus sub- 
duing, thus conquering, thus transmuting, you 
will, O reader ! whilst living in the flesh, cross 
the dark waters of mortality, and will reach 
that Shore upon which the storms of sorrow 
never beat, and where sin and suffering and 
dark uncertainty cannot come. Standing upon 
that Shore, holy, compassionate, awakened, 
and self-possessed and glad with unending 
gladness, you will realize that, 



200 The Way of Peace 

4 ' Never the Spirit was born, the Spirit will cease to 

be never ; 
Never was time it was not, end and beginning are 

dreams ; 
Birthless and deathless and changeless remaineth the 

Spirit forever ; 
Death hath not touched it at all, dead though the 

house of it seems." 

You will then know the meaning of Sin, of 
Sorrow, of Suffering, and that the end thereof 
is Wisdom ; will know the cause and the issue 
of existence. 

And with this realization you will enter 
into rest, for this is the bliss of immortality, 
this the unchangeable gladness, this the un- 
trammelled knowledge, undefiled Wisdom, and 
undying Love ; this, and this only, is the 
realization of Perfect Peace. 



The Realization of Perfect Peace 201 



O thou who wouldst teach men of Truth ! 

Hast thou passed through the desert of doubt ? 
Art thou purged by the fires of sorrow ? hath Truth 

The fiends of opinion cast out 
Of thy human heart ? Is thy soul so fair 
That no false thought can ever harbor there ? 

O thou who wouldst teach men of Love ! 

Hast thou passed through the place of despair ? 
Hast thou wept through the dark night of grief ? does 
it move 
(Now freed from its sorrow and care) 
Thy human heart to pitying gentleness, 
Looking on wrong, and hate, and ceaseless stress ? 

O thou who wouldst teach men of Peace ! 

Hast thou crossed the wide ocean of strife ? 
Hast thou found on the Shores of the Silence, release 

From all the wild unrest of life ? 
From thy human heart hath all striving gone, 
Leaving but truth, and Love, and Peace alone ? 



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Effect of Thought on Circumstances 

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one. " You will be what you will to be " is not merely a 
poetical thought, but a practical truth. With a definite 
ideal in his mind, believing in it and working toward it, 
Mr. Allen claims a man can make of himself what he wills. 
" As a Man Thinketh " is a book to make a friend of and 
may be studied for years without exhausting its truths. 
62 pages, 3^x6 inches, printed on exception- 
ally heavy Canterbury Laid paper and bound 
in Ooze Calf with board backs; handsome cover 
design and title in Sepia Brown; an exquisite 
gift volume; first American edition. 

Postage paid 60 cents 
THE SCIENCE PRESS, The Republic, CHICAGO 






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